The Legacy of Jamie Madrox
by thevixendixon
Summary: Jamie goes to Muir Island to get away. In Bayville Bobby and the X-Men investigate seemingly abandoned buildings. What is Jamie running from? What’s so important about these missions? Most importantly, what do the two have to do with each other? futurefic
1. I dreamt a nightmare

Welcome. This story is the result of a dare I posed to myself to write an action story with suspense, cliff hangers, surprises, and all the rest. It is my very first attempt at such. I hope I have succeeded. Due to this nature I simply ask that if you feel the desire to review, which I sincerely hope you do, do not spoil any of the major reveals in your review where everyone can see them. Which are the major reveals? Trust me, you'll know them when you get there. Also, feel free to get thoroughly sucked into this little mystery. It's all been written and now patiently waits on my laptop for the day when your eyes get to read it. I plan to post a new chapter every week, hopefully on Wednesdays. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: I only own the story.

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**Chapter 1:** I dreamt a nightmare.

**Muir Island  
Present Day**

"Good morning Jamie."

Jamie opens his eyes. It's dark. He can't move. "What?" he says groggily. "Who's there? I can't see." His words show only a hint of the caution and panic he feels.

"Don't you recognize my voice?" it asks calmly. "It's yours."

It is, isn't it? "James?" And upon utterance of the name he begins to see the swirls of light and color. They get brighter. They get bigger. He can see James now. And now he sees his old room back at the mansion. Back in Bayville. It's weird how after all those years, that room somehow became synonymous with his identity, how he sees himself. And how he misses it.

"Why do you insist on calling me that brother?" James asks of him. He's talking so weird. Why is he talking so weird? "I'm not James. There never was a James. You know that."

They're transported outside somewhere. Sitting on a bench. Sunny day. Green grass. Everything is normal. Not perfect. Just normal.

Whatever that means.

"It's a beautiful day."  
Jamie looks at his dupe. He turns his head again. "Yes it is."

The ground starts to break up. Jamie looks down patiently as his world crumbles beneath him. There's a bird. Maybe. Maybe a bird. A sky fish. He watches it fly off against the backdrop of black above him. It's gone. He brings his head down. Things have changed. There's more black. It's everywhere. And he is everywhere. An army of Jamies stand before him. They stand and watch. Only it can't be an army of 'Jamie's can it? They can't be Jamie. He's Jamie.

"James?" he asks.

"There is no James." They all respond in unison, but they speak with a single voice. Jamie's voice. "Only you." And this sends a shiver up his spine.

One of them steps forward from the pack. The others watch. Not the one that strayed from the group but Jamie. A thousand brown eyes all make contact with his. A thousand eyes to make judgment. "Why didn't you save us brother?" The leader of the pack asks. "It hurts to die." He sounds so vulnerable, so betrayed. And then he gets that sinister grin on his face. The one that makes Jamie think James really did end up consorting with the Devil in Hell. And it gets wider. "Let me remind you what it feels like."

James reaches out for him. Jamie tries desperately to move but he can't.

The pack no longer watches. They don't have eyes. Only massive, massive, grins.

James makes a claw with his fingers and grabs Jamie's chest. Jamie's body wrenches with pain and he screams in horror. His back arches, his skin boils. He falls to his knees. James jerks at his hand and a bright light shines from Jamie's heart. It's all he sees. It drowns out everything. But the pain. He still feels the pain.

He screams again, though this time, not in fear.

And that scream turns into a dull whimper in the pale glow of the leaking hallway light as Jamie awakens with a start.

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

He walks through the empty hallways with a bowl of cold cereal in his hands. This is one of the happier side effects of early morning nightmares. First one up always gets the prime choice of cereal, Sugar Bombs or the new and improved kid tasted confectioner-approved Chocolate Sugar Bombs.

From the corner of his eyes he sees a shadow behind him. Like a ghost. He's not alone. "It's still early, Claudette," he calls as he turns to look at the girl. She stares at him indirectly with vacant eyes as she uses a hand to study the wall beside her. Jamie moves his head down to catch her gaze which she effectively shifts away from. "Claudette?" he says in a protective brotherly way, "Go back to bed." She turns from him and he watches as she slowly makes her way through an open doorway. He makes his way over to close the door for her but first looks in on the twins with a smile similar to those of adults entertained by the innocence of children though the girls are only two years younger than himself.

He then continues on with his journey. Finally he arrives at the door that is his destination. Not his own, but that of one Rahne Sinclair.

Jamie slowly turns her doorknob and quietly enters the room. He finds her desk chair with ease in the relative darkness of the curtained room and tests it. Swings it around. Sits in it and bounces up and down a bit. Did it have enough swivel for him this morning? Enough cushion? Apparently not as he discards this idea rather quickly. He stands up and walks to the foot of his friend's bed and watches her sleep. She breathes heavily. He wonders what she's dreaming about that she'd sleep so deeply. So peacefully. Him perhaps? Ha. Don't make him laugh. He takes bite after bite of his American cereal packaged for Scottish consumerism and she does not budge. And here he thought ferals had sensitive hearing. He takes another small bite as he walks around the corner to the side of her bed. He kicks her mattress. Hard. "Morning sunshine," he says loudly and cheerfully. He takes another bite.

Rahne jumps awake in her bed her skin becoming instinctively hairier and her teeth and nails grow larger and sharper. "What the –" she slurs. It's hard to talk when your mouth is full of fangs. Her eyes focus and she recognizes her attacker. She catches herself mid-morph and changes back. She lets out a sigh as she collapses back into her bed. "Jamie," she mumbles into her pillow, "I swear to God one of these days I'm gonna –"

"Strip me naked and have your way with me?" he finishes for her. "Cause you already did that. I have the scars to prove it."

"Yeah?" comes the muffled response. "Be thankful I didn't rip your vocal cords right out too."

"My vocal cords?" He puts a hand to his throat protectively. "What good would that do?" he says hoarsely as if he has no voice.

"You're right," she concedes while turning to face away from him. "I should just pull out the whole damn windpipe."

"Oh Rahne, you big joker you," he laughs while plopping himself down beside her. She groans at the movement of the bed and buries herself further into the covers. He takes another bite of his cereal before putting the bowl down on Rahne's nightstand. He raises the covers a little and tries to peek through them but she manages to hold it down balled up in her fists. All he sees are little tufts of red hair. "Won't you come out to play?" he says very sweetly. She yanks the blanket away from his grasp. "Greet the brand new day?" he continues unfazed. He just needs to be a bit more aggressive. "The sun is up!" he belts out in full song as he jumps off of her bed and yanks apart her curtains. "The sky is blue!"

Rahne stalks out of bed taking one slow steady step at a time. She chases him zombie-like with that determined angry look on her face that tells you she's just about ready to empty your guts onto the floor. This makes Jamie smile; she never follows through. Still, he steps away from her warily.

"It's beautiful," he says as she finally pushes him out of her room and slams the door in his face. He brings his face up to the door. "And so are you?"

Silence.

He raps on the door with a single knuckle. "Rahne? Rahne, can I get my cereal back? It's the last of the chocolate. Rahne?" Her heavy footsteps seem to storm to the door and he backs away cautiously. "Or you know, never mind." She opens the door with one hand and holds the bowl in the other. She's pissed. Jamie smiles. "I knew you'd come through for me," he jokes. She thrusts the bowl into his stomach. Most of the milk and cereal spill out. And again the door slams. Jamie looks around at the mess of his shirt while rubbing the now sore spot on his stomach. He looks at soggy floor below him before loudly announcing through the door to her, "I'm not cleaning that up."

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

**Bayville, New York**

Bobby Drake kicks the side of his shoe against his fancy mahogany bed frame and watches a clump of dried mud fall to the freshly vacuumed floor. As he puts his foot down, the dirt ingrains further into the carpet fiber, but he pays little attention to this as he walks over to the matching desk to gather his necessities. Keys, phone, wallet. Same as always. His motions are mechanical as they almost always are these days.

She stands at his doorway, right at the edge of his territory. The room feels foreign to her now regardless of all those hours she spent in it oh so many months ago. The back of his feathery blonde head faces her and she wonders if he knows she's there. "Penny for your thoughts?" Her voice slices through the dark silence of the room.

"A penny? Haven't you heard of inflation? Cost of living increase? Time and half?" Bobby jokes as he always had only now there's a certain pain behind his words. The jokes seem forced and there is a distance in his voice as he longs for a time when they used to come easier. For a time when he could hide behind those lighthearted moments and bathe in the comfort they once provided.

"I get it," she counters sarcastically hoping that even though his jokes won't work, hers, lame as they may be, might. "You're trying to be funny."

"As long as you get it," he concedes as he lets out a deep breath of air. The thought of continuing the banter is too much work for such little payoff. He finally turns to her though she has an inkling it's only because he plans on leaving the room and she's standing in the way.

"Seriously, Bobby."  
"Seriously what?"

She pushes her back against the doorframe as he brushes past her quickly. It's a cold and awkward moment. Nothing like the moments they had back when he first arrived, but after all these months, normal nonetheless. "Talk to me."

He looks her straight in the eyes. His are a chilly blue. It seems to fit now, that they call him Iceman. "I don't have anything to say, Ange," he says with such sincerity she almost believes him. Not that what she believes matters one way or the other. And then he turns his back to her like he had already done so many times in the past, like he never would've even thought to do before, and walks away.

She waits a moment before she calls after him. "It wasn't your fault," is all she can think to say.

"That's what they say," he calls back. And she watches as he disappears to his danger room session or his basketball game or whatever it is he wore those ratty old tennis shoes to.

And finally she replies to him though she's the only one around to listen. "Then why don't you believe them?"


	2. the special class

Disclaimer: None of these characters are OCs. I don't own any of them. Kudos to you if you can figure them out without looking them up.**

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**Chapter 2:** the special class

Meet the Muir Island team. The students Xavier himself couldn't handle. The misfits. Moira's special class.

Officially known as the MacTaggert School, the name 'the special class' was given by some pompous uncouth young mutants attending the Bayville Academy while bullying some unfortunate new MacTaggert School recruit. Though the perpetrators of the incident have long since been forgotten, the name has stuck if only as an in-joke amongst those very same MacTaggert School students that seem to so enjoy self-deprecating humor.

And it really is a special school.

They have a lot of group meetings in order to foster a sense of belonging and community. Friendly competitions to teach independence and confidence. Every hour and activity is planned ahead based on the psychological benefits of routine and structure in such a way that even the fact that the days of the special class often seem less organized than their un-special counterparts in Bayville is designed to support responsible, mature decision making when faced with freedom and choice.

There is a sick bay of course as it was the Professor himself that funded the creation and upkeep of one in every outpost his weary and battled X-Men might be unfortunate enough to have to recuperate in. But this one is different as the center's primary goal is the mental health of the Island's residents making full use of the dim lighting, non-confrontational environment, and weekly visits from one Doc Samson, psychiatrist specifically trained in youth counseling. The good doctor rounds out the school's permanent staff along with caretakers Rahne Sinclair, heir to the MacTaggert throne, and Illyana Rasputin, returned MacTaggert School graduate.

It's interesting when you consider how the relatively newer residential program's needs and goals have similarly overtaken those of the original MacTaggert lab with which it shares a home.

Perhaps most influential to the program's continued existence, despite its lack of emphasis on proactive combative training and the need to create an army of mutant warriors, is the overall sense of well being and the successful lives graduates of the program go on to achieve even years after attending.

Created only a few short years after Xavier's original in Bayville, graduates of the MacTaggert School could boast the start of promising futures in both their professional and personal lives as compared to the sometimes tragic lives of graduates from Bayville, the first example of which would be the Evan Daniels debacle early on in the X-Men's existence and the latest most damning of course being the Jean Grey – Phoenix incident that had occurred only two years ago. It had caused the disbanding of the official combat ready X-Men which consisted of Cyclops, Rogue, and Nightcrawler, among others, turning the Bayville Academy back into an actual school. Doc Samson still blames himself for not bringing more attention to the young woman's state of mind when Xavier had placed yet another powerful mental block into her delicate psyche. Though, I digress.

I suppose we can begin with Arlee 'Buff' Hicks.

Arlee stood at her current height of five foot when she reached puberty at age 11. She hasn't grown an inch in the 4 years since, not lengthwise at least. Indeed her body has grown in every other way as it attempts to fit Arnold Schwarzenegger size muscles onto her tiny frame. Someone had told her once that it was a good thing because he ended up being governor of California, not to mention Jesse Ventura or even Hulk Hogan with his reality show contract. It didn't help. At her last weigh in she weighed well over 200 pounds with hardly an ounce of fat. There's no pain involved or really any change in metabolism, as is often found with these cases. It's just, she's a quiet girl. Not quite suited for a body that brings her such attention. However, as she walks down the streets of some busy city, it's never really the comments or looks of spectators that bother her. What bothers her is what she sees in the mirror every morning and the multitude of negative things she says to herself daily. It doesn't help to find that she can't hold on to a normal sized pencil and on the off chance that she does, can snap it without a thought.

And while Arlee holds attention because of the way her body looks, Sooraya 'Dust' Qadir, as a burka wearing hijabi, often garners it because of her lack thereof. Sooraya is an Afghani refugee deposited on the island only about a year ago after a brief stay at the school in Bayville ended in a few difficulties between her and the other students, the same kind of students responsible for the school's unofficial name. Officially her transcript states culture shock as the reason for her transfer and this is not far from the truth, but with the multi-cultural status of the Bayville Academy, culture shock is very easily a situation that is often taken care of by Xavier. No, Sooraya is at Muir because she is a refugee. A victim of a war she had no say in and a war that still haunts her. More than the things she's seen, it bothers her that the only reason she was pulled out was because she was a mutant. A mutant with a very battle useful power by the way to turn herself into a living sandstorm. And after a year of pretending to be a Westerner, where has it gotten her? Where is her family? Where are her friends? She prays for their souls daily because she does not know if they are alive or not. She blames herself for not going back and finding out. And after all this, the last thing she is willing to do is put her trust into the man that had recruited her because of her abilities and asked her to fight, against robots and holograms or not.

Next we come to Barnell 'Beak' Bohusk. Barnell was born a beautiful child in an otherwise average family with average lives. This made him extraordinary and his life quickly followed suit. One day, when he was 13 he awoke to find a feather on his pillow. That was the start of an unusually awkward transformation into adolescence. Barnell's full transformation took him about a year and a half in which he lost 50 pounds, grew exceptionally lanky arms and legs, hollowed out his bones making him much more susceptible to fractures and breaks, lost most of his gorgeous locks of golden hair, grew what looked like the top half of a beak in the middle of his face (hence the name), and most irritatingly of all, grew a sparse collection of feathers in different areas around his body. Can you picture it?

He's broken his arm twice already but knows now how careful he needs to be and has learned how to deal with the tediousness associated with the shedding of old feathers and the rashes on his skin that form when new feathers begin to grow. These don't affect him as much as the fact that Barnell knew what life was like before looking the way he does now. It makes it hard for him the same way it's hard for Arlee, only she internalizes her pain where he externalizes. When he's angry he breaks things. When he feels trapped he likes to run, or when possible, fly. When he feels ignored, he yells and argues. When he's bored he does whatever sounds fun, despite the consequences. When he begins to feel sorry for himself, he teases others. It seems the only way he knows how to cope is to come up with trouble. Because even if the teasing or the breaking or the yelling is momentary, it is one less moment he spends dwelling on himself and his problems.

Now for the twins. On first impression the two St. Croix sisters look completely out of place in this home for misfits. The girls are equal in their remarkable beauty and the wealth, fame, and connections of their diplomat father are more than welcome to them. But no. These good fortunes of their birth are shadowed by another. Claudette is autistic.

The girls don't have an alter ego after being lumped together as 'the twins' since before they were born. It's nice after some time to finally be known by their given names and not as 'the autistic one' and 'the autistic one's sister.' Their parents long ago had considered separating the two as they aged. Why punish their 'normal' child with the limits and defects of the other? But Nicole couldn't do it.

She has an air of royalty and arrogance about her after spending her childhood years feeling guilt over being the lucky one, frustration from being forever limited by the abilities of her sister, and even jealousy for the attention that seemed to be only allotted for the other twin. But inside the emotions that won out were understanding and love though she often hid it well. Nobody understood Claudette as she did, and in a way the same applied in the reverse situation as well. To lose her, to lose each other, would in a way turn both girls mute. So she came along to the Island under the pretense that it was Claudette that stood to benefit, though with hidden struggles of her own unfairly forced upon a girl so young.

It helps also that the girls have been mutants since they were born and their powers would prove to be quite effective in their various difficulties with each other. The two 17 year olds could merge their minds and bodies into one 34 year old super powered woman. This stroke of luck of course could not last forever. At 60 they're joined form would be aged to 120 and no yet known superpowers in the world could help them then, so they do what they can, while they can. And while Nicole hates this loss of her independence and individuality, this body they dubbed Monet jokingly for Claudette's love of art and Nicole's nostalgia for the country in which they were born, is often seen roaming the residence halls for the benefit of Claudette.

Though Claudette's personality is all her own. She can draw for hours and loves the color blue. It's not unusual to see her sitting beside Gordon (who will be introduced shortly) in the kitchen sharing cookies and working on their respective masterpieces communicating in silence, hers completely in blue and his in every color but.

And finally we come to Gordon Lefferts, 7 years old. Runt. He is slightly telepathic with a sprinkling of empathy. Rather than hearing others' thoughts as many telepaths do, he feels them and sees them. Anger is not red like we often picture it. It's a dark purple with spikes of green, though this changes from person to person, moment to moment. Happiness is the color of orange soda with ice and the edges of pink sometimes bleed into it. Sadness is brown, dull and boring. Love is blue. Like Claudette.

He wears big coke bottle classes and spends much of his free time at Moira's side in the lab tinkering with his own set of beakers and an old microscope. They all know he looks like a nerd now but one day he will come to be a great man in his own accord because he'll see things with the brain of a scientist but the heart of an empath.

Gordon's parents had trouble with him because of the way he gleans things he's not yet old enough to understand and they're not yet prepared enough to explain. Like many parents often ask themselves even of their own normal powerless children, how do you raise a little boy that is so different from other little boys? The difference when raising a mutant is that the Lefferts never quite figured that answer out. It became especially tricky when they first considered their 'trial' separation. He saw it in them before they did. Their faces used to turn a deep blue sometimes when they looked at each other. But somewhere that blue faded and Gordon didn't know where it went. He wonders sometimes if that's where Claudette's crayon comes from.

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Slow chapter I know. To make up I might post the next chapter by like friday or something. I've thought about it and updating only once a week means this story will go on for months and I'm not sure I like that idea for either myself or you. I haven't figured out a new schedule though. Maybe mondays and fridays?


	3. alcohol in a school for minors

**Chapter 3:** alcohol in a school for minors

"Come on, Logan," the urgency and frustration of his voice is clear as Bobby pulls out yet another drawer of the garage tool chest and searches frantically through it. Logan always kept his best stuff in the garage. Alcohol in a school for minors. Even back when Bobby was sixteen. At least he never had a hard time finding it then.

Wrench, smaller wrench, some sort of pipe with a weird end, broken box cutter, hammer-ish. Dammit.

Suddenly a hand comes from over his shoulder and slams the drawer shut with a clatter and Bobby's startled jump reaches to the tips of his fingers.

"Looking for something?" Logan's gruff voice is as nonchalant as he can make it, which has the unexpected side effect of making it all the more threatening. Bobby turns his head to him with one very annoyed eyebrow raised. "I thought I heard my name," the feral man offers by way of explanation as if it is needed. Bobby gives him such a look of angst-ridden disdain, but Logan's used to it. In his time at the Institute, there's hardly a look he hasn't seen. "Careful, Frosty. I don't like my kids drinking the way you've been doing, and especially not when I'm the one paying for it."

Bobby pushes away from the man in a huff thrusting his clenched fists deep into his pockets. "I guess it's a good thing I'm not one of your kids then."

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

The monitor of one of Moira's bulky lab computers suddenly goes dark before lighting up again with the brief animation of a crackling fireplace. The screensaver has been triggered. Beside the screen are two clean tennis shoes crossed one over the other with cloth covered legs sticking out of them. They lead to a young man stretched out over an office chair without a care in the world, eyes closed, gently napping.

Jamie naps a lot.

Though he had no experience in a lab, Moira had decided to employ him as her research assistant, the main reason being that he couldn't spend all day lounging around the house just because he had already graduated from high school. He's become quite computer savvy in this time though he has an inkling that Moira still never gives him any real work. A lot of his time is spent on tedious things, no ground-breaking scientific discovery or anything. She's explained it to him before that, like life, real science is made up of 98% plus of tediousness. Jamie doesn't care enough to listen. He just knows how bored he gets, half the time not even knowing what exactly he's working on and _never_ knowing what Moira really does. And so he feels justified in his naps.

The rest of the students must think he's so lazy. They don't know about the long nights he spends awake in a bid to keep the nightmares away. He'll sleep anywhere. The physical vulnerabilities of this unconscious compromised state don't bother him. The awareness the X-Men had trained him in once is gone. From now on the only things he fights are his inner demons and memories.

But you can never really get away from your memories can you. Even now with his eyes closed, he's looking out over Bayville. Where he always goes when he closes his eyes.

It feels warm under the sun in this other world of his. His steps are soft. He looks down to see his shoes muddy. They just watered the grass. It's a dark green, the grass that is, especially compared to his now brown shoes. He wonders what they do to make it so green. It's nice and all to think that someone was going through all this trouble just for him to enjoy, well sort of, but it still makes him feel like he should be playing the 8th hole at some golf course and not, you know, mourning the dead. But he doesn't think he would like golf anyways. Not that he liked mourning the dead.

The grave isn't fresh anymore, though Jamie supposes he'll always feel like it's fresh. Twenty years from now with himself nearly forty and when his thinning hair starts to show subtle signs of gray, it will still be fresh, always reminding him of the very first time he saw it. At least this time it's more real. _At least_ he catches himself thinking, as if that's a good thing.

He considers sitting down. It just seems like the natural thing to do but he changes his mind when he remembers the dampness of the lawn, and of course, the grave beneath him.

The tombstone catches his eye again and unknowingly he reads the etched letters on its smooth face. It's not really reading though when the words are carved into his mind. Over and over again. "James Arthur Madrox," it says in big bold letters for the big bold man that he is. "He takes with him a part of our soul." It's very personal of course. 'Our' for himself and his dupes, if there ever happened to be another dupe, and 'soul,' singular for the single soul they share. It's just the kind of thing Jamie would want on a grave with his name on it. But then, he _did_ write it. It's an odd thought to be staring at your own epitaph.

"Hey," Jamie hears a voice and he looks around the empty cemetery for its owner.

"Jamie!" He feels a weight land on his midsection, causing him to wake up. Gordon is staring at him closely. He also spends a lot of time in the lab though he does so by choice. The smile on his face fades as Jamie's eyes grow accustomed to their wakened state. "Why are you sad?" he asks so sincerely.

Jamie fakes a very realistic smile, one that a non-telepath could easily mistake for real, and denies the accusation with a simple, "I'm not." He reaches to his shelf-like stomach where one of Gordon's action figures rests and hands it back to the boy. Gordon takes it self-consciously. It upsets him to know that Jamie is lying but he realizes by now that older people lie a lot. The difference is that Gordon knows when someone lies and Jamie knows that Gordon can tell. Though the thought doesn't form coherently in his 7 year old mind, it makes Gordon wonder what the point is. Which one of them is Jamie trying to protect?

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

The girl known as Husk finds Bobby's room at the end of the boys' hall rather easily. His door is open and she takes a peek inside. As one of the supervisors for the floor his room is larger than those for the students but most of it remains untouched. The far wall hosts a dusty dresser and an otherwise empty desk with a pile of washed clothes stacked on top of it. Nearer to the door is his unkempt bed. There once was a queen size in its place but Bobby gave it up after waking up one too many nights with nightmares of being lost because he couldn't feel the edges his mattress. The fitted bed sheet covers only three corners of the mattress as Bobby has always had a hard time with that one walled in corner. Paige wonders if he's just lazy or if he really never figured out how much easier it is to tuck that corner in first. Beside the bed is Bobby's personal entertainment center with his own TV, gaming console, makeshift nightstand-coffee table, and permanently reclined recliner. There's an old Power Rangers sticker on the corner of the TV making it distinctly his. A nearby bookshelf houses only a few games and half a bag of cheese puffs. The furniture is all new, mahogany, molded in the Professor's favorite classic make but somehow Bobby in his special way could still make it look like a freshman year dorm room. Bobby sits in a computer chair that has been dragged to the TV from its formerly designated place by the desk. It is one of the more comfortable office chairs with armrests and a mesh back so the young Guthrie can see little bits of Bobby's hair stick through the back as he watches one of those shows about sharks. She can understand the fascination.

"Mr. Drake?" Bobby's head twitches and there is a small crash as both the remote and a game controller meet the hardwood floor.

"Huh?" He rubs an eye lazily with one finger as he swivels his chair around.

"Sorry. I didn't realize you were sleeping."

He murmurs some sort of response but it gets lost on the way to the door. "So, Baby Guthrie," he begins making his way to the remote to change the channel but stops himself. They're the great killers of the ocean. It feels almost disrespectful to turn it off. Plus, he can't concentrate without some kind of white noise. "What can I do for you?"

Paige continues idling at the door the way neighborhood kids avoid the house with that one creepy old guy but eventually she makes her way slowly inside in a way largely unnoticed by either of them. "I was hoping we could talk."

"Talk? About what?"

She hesitates for a small moment. "About last summer." It's as uncomfortable for her as she's sure it is for him.

Suddenly defensive, Bobby answers, "Who sent you here? The Professor? Hank?" He scoffs, "Figures."

Paige takes an instinctive step back in response to his abrasive reaction. She's confused. She doesn't know what to say. "Um, no."

"Then what? Bobby stands from his chair with a force that turns his chair back around to the TV. He looks threatening in his anger. "A dare?"

"No. I swear," she throws up her hands in surrender, "It's nothing like that."

"Listen kid, I don't care who put you up to this but, trust me, you don't know who you're messing with or what you're getting into." Paige has by now backed her way to the door and Bobby blocks her view into his disheveled room by standing in her way. "Now get out of here before I decide to do something about it!"

And DKAM! He slams the door on her.

For a moment there is silence but Paige doesn't leave. "I know he was my friend too," she says doubtfully to the smooth face of the white door. Another second and she hears a squeak as Bobby opens the door.

There is an interested look on his face. "What was that?"

"I said he was my friend too," she repeats loudly with a new found confidence, "and nothing you can say or do is going to make me stop trying to figure out what really happened. So you might as well just tell me your side of the story because either way I will find out." Then more seriously she adds, "I'm not backing down." And immediately it looks as if she's backed down when her southern sensibilities pull the finger she had been jabbing into Bobby's chest down to her side as if she's surprised with how angry she's gotten with a man she hardly knows.

Bobby smiles a little smirk. She's impressed him and these days that's a tough thing to do. "You really want to know? Fine." He opens the door only a little wider allowing her to enter. "Grab a controller and if you're any better than that no thumbs brother of yours, then maybe, maybe we can talk."


	4. lust, love, and the occasional library

**Chapter 4:** lust, love, and the occasional library

Jamie closes his eyes. It's late and he's tired but he doesn't feel like sleeping. He doesn't want to. His hair is still damp from his shower and his hands now moist as he pulls them through those same wet locks to the back of his head and rocks his feet slightly on their heels. He opens his eyes again and waits for them to adjust to the faint light coming in from the bottom of the door. That had to take what? All of two minutes? He sighs if only internally. Part of him just really wants it, needs it, to be morning already but the other part of him isn't willing to go through those many hours of night left to get there.

Chhhkah.

This makes him smile. It's the sound of his doorknob turning.

Jamie props himself up onto his elbows to take a look. "Hello, lover."

She stands there as a shadow amongst the light streaming in from the hallway in a scene that seems the polar opposite of every painting he's ever seen deemed to be holy. Oh, but she is holy.

"You're funny," she says with no special intonation yet still managing to exude such sarcasm as she enters the tiny room closing the door behind her. Quick to business, her arms cross over her chest as she reaches for the bottom of her shirt. She peels it away from her body and up over her head as she walks in one quick smooth act. "But seriously," she drops the shirt where she stands, "don't talk." She has only one destination. She crawls onto his bed with such determination driven by pure instinct that the act itself is as sensual as anything else she could possibly do.

Jamie is hypnotized.

"You ruin the mood."

She comes closer and he quickly pulls his shirt off before Rahne can tear it off. He's lost a lot of good clothes that way. "Yes, ma'am," he says excitedly as he throws the shirt in whatever direction it happens to go.

She pushes him down into the bed roughly with one hand on his chest. "What did I just say?"

He feels a leg slide over his stomach and then one at each side as she rests her weight on his pelvis. He brings his hands up her thighs to her waist and slips his fingers into her belt loops only momentarily lest they unwittingly get caught in a moment of lust. "Sorry." Her hands on his shoulders she leans into him until his head sinks deep into his pillow and kisses him hard on the mouth. In due time her grasp releases leaving little red fingerprints on his bare shoulders. She pushes off and looks at him gawking back, breathless. "Shutting up now."

And they start.

Jamie traces his fingers down the scope of perfection that is Rahne's body. If his hands had a voice they would be saying only one thing: God, she's beautiful. His hands center on her stomach. Her soft sculpted stomach with the cute little bulge of fat right below her navel. They run back up via her sides getting separated in the curves along the way. They don't slide as easily going up. Not when they're up against fur. But he likes that.

Jamie himself has a thin layer of flab covering what once used to be muscle. He can't understand what Rahne sees in this. She says it's cute. That word makes him think about puppies and teddy bears. Exactly what any man wants the older, hotter girl he's sleeping with to think about him.

Rahne tastes blood. She's nicked his lip. A far cry from the kid gloves she used to have on when dealing with him way back when, always afraid she'd crush him or tear him to pieces or something. But no matter how much they sometimes acted like it, neither were kids anymore nor do they pay any attention as adults.

She slowly moves down his face to his neck, the trickle of blood leaving its mark. The feel of her fangs tickles. Not at all like he imagined fangs on his neck would feel like. Not like Dracula. Maybe because Dracula goes straight for the kill. But then again, in a way so does Rahne.

Her fingers grow claws. Jamie only knows this because soon they run down his back creating new pathways over old scars. It's a quick pain. A refreshing pain. Jamie wants to speak out but he bites his bloody lip. Their love making is silent. Always. Barnell sleeps next door. His back starts to smart with a dullness but Jamie ignores this. He likes it. Every throb is a reminder.

And her body shifts again.

Rahne has a little golden cross around her neck. She never takes it off. It gets sandwiched between their moist naked bodies. Sometimes Jamie swears the little marks it leaves behind of its presence on his flesh last unnaturally long afterwards. As if God were branding him for his sin. At least that's what he would think if he were a God – fearing man. Or for that matter, a God – believing man. He hasn't found much of anything to believe in in this short life of his. Though he has faith in this. In this moment. In Rahne.

It is a moment born of necessity, convenience. Born of some twisted friendship and memories of carefree days and pubescent longing. She… she spent her days pretending to be the human she wasn't and her nights the animal unleashed for an hour at a time. And he was just a boy thrust into manhood but lost along the way. They were both lost, looking for themselves in the other's body. In this way at least it was a convergence of their souls as much as it was their bodies.

But she never stayed for longer than the moment.

Why? Maybe it was the fact that she was a caretaker and he one of her charges. Maybe it was their mutual respect and care for Moira, a woman that had opened her heart and home to them both during their hours of greatest need. Maybe it was her strict Presbyterian upbringing managing to somehow rear its head again only once the act was done. Maybe it was because they weren't really lovers. And they knew it. They knew it all those years ago in Bayville. They knew it that first night when they both lost their virginity to each other in some of the most passionate 'love making' either would probably ever experience. They knew it now. No matter how much one or the other thought at times they might be or wanted so badly for it to happen, they weren't. They weren't and they never would be.

Or maybe it was because during those twilight filled morning hours after that first night, it was the first and only time Jamie told her his story.

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

Josh Foley, Elixir, sits at the corner of the giant mahogany table in the Institute's library so he can easily distract himself by people watching. A calculus book rests in front of him open to the same page it was an hour ago. Josh is more of an art person. Besides, most of his desired colleges had already made their decisions. They didn't care anymore if he passed one calc test or not.

There are a few others in the room but only one is of his interest. "Bastard," he mutters under his breath while he fidgets with his pencil in that nervous-aggravated way he tends to do almost unconsciously.

"What's wrong with you?" Paige comes up beside him no doubt hearing the one word comment. She pushes aside the forgotten homework and leans against Josh's table nearly skewing his view just to bother him the way she would with her little brothers back home. She follows his gaze. Bobby.

"Didn't you hear? Angie left this morning."

"What?" No, she hadn't heard.

"Yeah. To California."

"Oh." It takes awhile for it to sink in. Not even a goodbye. She wasn't close to Angie but it bothers her nonetheless. "And you're mad at Bobby because…?" She has to ask even though she already knows. Even though she realizes she should probably be upset too, not because Angie left but because of the way things played out.

Josh sits there silently fuming. "He pushed her away." She's never seen him like this. "He let her leave."

She doesn't really notice when she comes to Bobby's defense. It's just so natural. "He didn't make her do anything. She's a full grown woman."

Josh looks to Paige after all this time. "She's also important to me." She didn't know that about him. "I don't trust him, Paige. You shouldn't be spending so much time with him."

Paige scoffs at the suggestion. "Sure thing, _dad_. And what time is curfew again?" She shifts to leave and Josh gets a hold of her wrist in a grasp that's a little too tight for her comfort. Her mind suddenly flares of feministic thoughts and questions of her independence and strength.

"Seriously Paige." His face is like stone. "Why him?"

She struggles a little to wriggle her hand from out of his grasp and some amount of her 'husk' lands on the table below with her expression turning sour. She hates being treated like a child and nobody should feel so entitled to make her question her own self-worth.

"Seriously Josh?" she mocks him with her hands pushing down on the table in front of him. "Because he's the only one that looks affected by what happened last summer. He's the only one that cares enough to tell me the truth." And she knows it bothers Josh because he does care, in that one way at least. "Hey Bobby," she calls to him while still staring down at Josh, daring him to do something about it, "wait up."

He watches as she saunters off, her expression changing dramatically the moment she sets her eyes on Bobby. Quietly, and alone, he finishes their conversation, "That's cause there's nothing to tell."

* * *

I thank you dear readers for your patience in reading this admittedly long set up. I just thought I might let you know that next chapter we begin part 1 of what I like to call The Story of James Madrox.


	5. the birth of James Madrox

**Chapter 5:** the birth of James Madrox

**Bayville, New York  
****One year ago**

Jamie looks down at his old beat up sneakers peeking out from under the fringe of his red robe. If Amara were still around she would probably be telling him how stupid he was for going to the gym ten minutes before graduation. Not that others didn't try. It makes him feel like a rebel, all James Dean like but in his own sweaty way.

"You really wore those shoes?" Jamie looks up. Paige Guthrie, Sam's little sister. She looks so pretty with her hair down that way curling ever so slightly right about her shoulders and so proud with that class valedictorian medal around her neck. Brilliant and beautiful. How the heck is she related to Sam? She's the only other graduate from the Institute this year. It's an oddity that hasn't occurred since that very first class, before mutated kids started flocking in droves to the Institute from all corners of the globe. It's made the two of them close though neither would ever admit it.

"Why?" Jamie clicks his heels together for emphasis and ironically enough, after that sickeningly hopeful closing speech given by their beloved principal, he really was ready to head home. "Do they bother you?"

"The shoes don't bother me. The person wearing them does." So that's how she's related to Sam.

Jamie clutches his chest in feigned heartache. "Ouch. Guthrie, why do you pain me so?"

"Oh. Madrox." Paige mockingly reaches for her own heart with an overly dramatic, "Because you deserve it."

Jamie rolls his eyes. The things he had to put up with. "Come on Guthrie." He drapes an arm around her shoulders, which she quickly squirms out of. Trip to the gym and all. Not that she wouldn't squirm away otherwise. "I'd hate for you to have to miss your flight off to Hicksville."

"My flight to _Kentucky_ Madrox? Or the Professor's big surprise for you?"

Jamie's hands rise in surrender. "Okay okay. Can't blame a guy for being a little excited. New car and all."

"New car?" She raises an eyebrow in doubt.

"Are you kidding me? The guy's a billionaire or something. I think I'd be a little insulted by anything less."

"And to think, I just get a flight home." It comes out as sarcasm but Jamie likes to think of it as masked jealousy.

"You don't get it. I've been stuck with Xavier for 7 years. I think I deserve it."

"After 7 years with you he's the one that deserves it."

Jamie chooses to ignore this as he plays the fantasy over again in his head. "I wonder what it'll be." He sighs. "A new Beemer," he adds dreamily.

"Porsche."  
"What?"  
"It should be a Porsche."  
"Jaguar."  
"Rolls Royce."  
"Bugatti."  
"Maserati?"  
"Maserati."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

"You know graduating from high school means I can't call you a squirt anymore."

It takes a moment for Jamie's eyes to focus to the darker lighting of the Institute's foyer but as soon as it does, "Bobby!" Jamie sprints the two steps to him and gives his old friend a bear of a hug. It surprises Bobby how much the kid has grown in those few years. "I can't believe it's you! Wait, you?" With Jamie's hands on Bobby's shoulders he squints his eyes and makes an exaggerated effort to look behind the older… he's a man now isn't he? "Are you it? Are you the surprise?" he asks sounding quite disappointed. "Man. I wanted a car."

"Shut up you jerk," Bobby laughs and punches Jamie playfully in the arm resulting in three identical red-robed graduates to appear. One of the dupes comes from behind and surprises Bobby by pouncing on him. Jamie's a lot stronger than he remembered too especially when there's more than one.

As Bobby roughhouses a similarly red-robed blonde girl comes up beside Jamie, or one of his dupes. There's not much of a difference either way. She hands off a large bouquet of flowers. Jamie doesn't even question if they're actually for him. Obviously they're from Josh. He feels for the poor kid. Jamie knows a thing or two about unrequited crushes. "See ya, Madrox. Congratulations on the new Beemer," she jokes into his ear as she walks by.

He calls after her, "Whatever, Guthrie. You shouldn't have given me your flowers. They're never making it to Hicksville with you now," he threatens while he merges with another Jamie.

She shrugs as she walks away backwards so he can see the expression on her face. Flowers were never her thing.

"Guthrie?" Bobby questions to himself while in the middle of a headlock with one of the Jamies not even noticing the boy dissipate from his grasp until his arm is once again resting on his side. "That's not the Sam I remember."

"A lot's changed since you've been gone."

"I'll say. That reminds me. Where's everyone else?"

"It's been five years Bobby. Everyone else is gone. I should be the one asking you. How's Jubilee? Was your LA romance everything you hoped it would be?"

"I'll let you in on a little secret. Nothing in LA is ever what you hope it will be."

Another girl walks up. This one with fiery red hair and probably somewhere in her early to mid twenties, not to mention pretty easy on the eyes. She ruffles Jamie's hair like an annoying older sister as she walks by. "Congratulations, kid," Firestar smirks at him while he drops the flowers to quickly busy himself with fixing his hair.

Bobby's wide eyes follow her till she's well out of sight. "Who was that?" he asks vaguely.

Jamie had pulled out his sunglasses and now checks his image in its reflection. "Who? Angelica?"

"Angelica," Bobby rolls the sounds of every phoneme individually off his tongue.

"Whoa, Bobby, I know that look. Let's not get ahead of ourselves here."

"Why?" he asks still slightly dazed in response to the beating of his heart. "Is she taken?"

"Taken? No. She's just way out of your league," and Jamie braces as Bobby goes to punch him again.

_**ooooo**_ _**ooooo**_ _**break ooooo ooooo**_

Jamie wonders what Bobby is whispering to make her smile. Sweet nothings. A little touch here, giggle there, all from him. Is this what he spent all those years learning in college? And look at Angie. Trying her hardest to act like she doesn't care. Just the fact that she hasn't pretended to burn him yet means she cares. "Keep flirting on missions like that and someone's going to end up dead," he announces loud enough for everybody around to notice.

For a moment they both look like deer caught in the headlights. "Be right there!" Angie yells suddenly and rushes off to help Hank with his supposed problem though nobody else had heard him call. As she passes she smiles abashedly at Jamie with a wink as if to thank him for looking out for her.

Bobby's reaction is quite the opposite. "Jamie! What the heck?"

"Hey, I did you a favor." He answers quite logically, "Fire and ice don't mix. She would melt you."

"Melt me? Please." he mutters while trying to come up with some witty remark. "I'd just have Josh here fix me up brand new," he quips while patting the blonde kid on the back.

"Sorry Bobby," blonde kid answers, "I have morality issues about healing people on suicide missions."

The younger boys hold it in as long as they can before their serious faces contort into those of laughter and every other student nearby joins in. But it doesn't last long as soon the Wolverine shows up and silences them all with one simple sound. Snikt. They stare at him for a moment waiting until Logan impatiently responds. "Well, Frosty? Do your thing."

"Right." Bobby shakes his head a little to get his bearings. He's been conditioned not to make any sudden moves for the first few moments after Logan pops his claws. "Um, today is simple recon. Just an abandoned building. We're not looking for anything in particular, just looking. If you find anything you think might be interesting or looks fishy, you don't go near it. You just report it to one of us. So, uh, split up into teams. And since we're a little short of students for the summer, Jamie, you should split up too. Make sure one of your dupes sticks with Beast."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

Angie lands with Josh and one of the Jamies. It's probably intentional to keep the attention away from whatever it is that was going on between her and Bobby. They wouldn't dare joke around about it with her. They like her but deep down she knows she scares them just a little bit. It's not anything really, just the kind of fear you get out of any teenage boy when faced with a gorgeous 25 year old that likes to play with fire.

"What do you think we'll find down here?" asks one of the boys as they sift through the deserted underbelly of the building.

Angie leans over by a box and blows the dust off it delicately to read the markered print underneath. It flies into the air like a tiny snowstorm. "I don't know," she admits. With her supervisory position at the Institute it's unusual for her to be kept in the dark about such things. "Chemicals maybe. It looks like it used to be a lab."

"What kind of chemicals can we possibly need from a dump like this?" Josh asks while he pokes at some test tubes resting on a desk. They roll over and crash into a million pieces on the ground before he ever sees them move.

Angie rolls her eyes. "Oh, we're here just to give the Professor some peace and quiet." As if to prove her point Jamie inadvertently walks into a spider web, and in his panic to pull it off his face manages to create two additional dupes. "If I know Hank, he'd never use students for something really important. Most likely he's in the records room looking for some kind of research or blueprints. Just paper. Computer files."

"So you're saying it doesn't really matter what we do." Josh asks while Jamie already starts reaching for things he shouldn't be touching.

"Boys, don't do anything stupid." They cringe. They weren't boys. They were men. Young men maybe, but men nonetheless. "That's not what I'm saying at all."

Though true men might heed her words, as it is, Jamie finds an eyewash station and turns the knob not knowing what it is. For a moment nothing happens. It's clogged. "Oh," Jamie turns away disappointed. But the pressure builds while he doesn't look and finally it blows. The reddish brown liquid spurts out in one quick burst and rains down on the younger teen.

"Ugh." Disgusted, Josh takes a hand and tries to squeegee the water from off his tongue. "It went in my mouth."

Jamie laughs from across the room, "Don't worry about it. It's just water."

"Just water. I've never had water that tasted like that before," Josh murmurs under his breath as he grabs a beaker he hopes isn't glass and chucks it at the unsuspecting Jamie.

Angie's had enough of these childish games. She throws a fireball at the beaker and it flies across to the far end of the room where it shatters against the dully painted wall, but nobody notices because just at that moment they hear a much louder crash and dust flies as the whole building seems to shift on its foundation.

"Angie, what did you do?" Josh whispers cautiously.

"I don't think that was me."

They follow after the noise to the hallway but carefully lest another explosion turn them into unwitting victims. As soon as they exit their own little room they can see the aftermath. The dust is still moving so they follow its pathway the few yards to its epicenter around the corner but before they can make it any farther a blue furry arm shoots out in front of them and holds them in place. He coughs briskly as he tries to warn them. "Wait," he says hoarsely. "It might not be safe."

And the coughing comes again but it's not from Hank. The dust begins to settle and they start to see the shape. "Hank, we have to," Angie pleads. "There's somebody in there."

"No. We can't risk it."

Is it… "Jamie?" But Jamie was with her. How did he?

"What is it?" Jamie answers from behind.

"Jamie I think it's one of your dupes. Can you absorb him from here?"

"No. The three of you get out and take everyone you see with you," Hank orders. "I'll take care of this."

* * *

A/N: I don't know if I made the right choice with the Maserati. I'm a Bugatti girl myself. I dream of being a valet one day on the off chance I might actually get to drive one. But Maserati is just so much fun to say.


	6. the life of James Madrox

**Chapter 6:** the life of James Madrox

The Professor's office is dim. It's comforting after the past few days Hank has spent poring over white lab readouts and iridescent computer screens. The smooth cushioned seats give off a slight cold sensation to the touch not at all indicative of the summer's heat and Hank would do anything just to close his eyes for the moment. But moments no matter how miniscule don't belong to occupants of the Xavier household, especially when said occupants hold people's lives in their hands.

"Well Hank?"

A large furry hand sloppily pushes a folder of paper onto the Professor's desk. He rubs the bridge of his nose where his glasses usually rest while he recollects his thoughts. "The usual. Low-fever. Slight flu-like symptoms. Fluctuations in his powers."

The Professor scans through the papers in the file. He wears his nonchalant face, the one he discovered at his mother's funeral. "Not exactly how I thought it would go. I was expecting something a bit more," for a moment his scientific curiosity shines through surprising even him at such a time, "severe."

"We shouldn't be depending on our thoughts and expectations, Charles." Hank's words come out harshly in a mix of anger and disappointment tinted with just a bit of his exhaustion. "It doesn't seem as though they have been spot on lately as it is. We _thought_ the children were safe."

"I know and it is regrettable," The Professor answers in his steady quiet voice though it is never lost on the two whose office they are sitting in, "but there is no point in dwelling on the past when we need you now," he dismisses Hank's concerns as he flips through a few more pages before putting the folder down again. "Keep him in quarantine. I don't think he's safe just yet. In fact, I know that he isn't."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

**Some Weeks Later**

Bobby can't imagine how boring that infirmary must be. Especially in quarantine. No people to talk to, no windows, no fresh air, no computer, worst of all, no TV. For the first couple of weeks Dupe Jamie (or James as he was now being called to avoid any confusion) had told him it wasn't that bad. He had decided he would catch up on some reading. Bobby didn't know how much James hated to read and neither of them had realized how much longer he might actually have to be staying in there.

But it became painfully clear once the coughing and fever started and slowly but surely he stopped making his own dupes.

It's interesting how James kept duplicating himself and Jamie Prime hadn't used his powers since the incident. It's almost as if James was trying to ward off the loneliness that came after the visits from friends started to wane. Somehow it got into their heads that visiting a dupe was disrespectful to the real Jamie. That James was just an impostor. It's funny that they save their visits for the one that isn't sick. The one that isn't quarantined, even though this Jamie now seems to revel in his solitude.

That's why James needs a distraction.

Bobby tries his best to lift his TV onto his makeshift office chair dolly. It seems everything he has lately is makeshift. The TVs not that heavy once he gets it into the air. He puts his gaming system on top of it trying to balance the load as he makes it out of his door, a forgotten controller lagging behind on his bed. There's a group of students gathered outside a room in the hallway. He hopes to God Jamie isn't among them or one of Xavier's pets sent to find out how Bobby is coping though he knows it'll be next to impossible to lug that thing all the way to the basement levels without anyone noticing. He knows it's his job, scratch that, his duty, but dealing with students' emotional responses to the situation or the teachers' constant micromanaging concerns is the last thing he feels like doing right now. He wonders if God is on his side today as he begins his long walk down through the mansion.

"Hey, Bobby." Bobby cringes internally. It's almost like Jamie was waiting for him, though he knows how crazy that sounds. "What's going on?" His voice sounds so young these days. Questioning him the way he did when he was twelve and they tried to ditch him at the mall so they could sneak into an R rated movie.

Bobby hesitates. "Oh," he shrugs as if it's no big deal. He was told once that people dealing with hard times wanted others to act normal in front of them. He doesn't know for sure. Other than what he'd done to himself once so long ago, Bobby has never had to go through a hard time. "It's for, you know, the other…" His sentence dies off on its own but Jamie still understands.

"There is no other," he says, quietly yet bold. "His name is James. Ok? James. We're not interchangeable."

"I know. It just slipped out. I'm sorry."

"God, just stop making everything such a big deal."

"Okay," Bobby says. He's treating him like a kid again. Where he'd rather say anything just to get him to stop than listen to what he's really saying. Jamie's okay with it. He knows Bobby's a good guy and he's done more for Jamie since this whole thing has started than any of the others combined.

Jamie inches away to leave and Bobby decides to wait until he knows Jamie is safe inside his own bedroom. Not that much can happen in this short distance. Jamie turns to Bobby before he enters the room, "You know, he's not even a real person." He sounds slightly angry, almost jealous of James. "He's just a stupid dupe. Trust me. I can make hundreds of them."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

**Even More Weeks Later**

James lies in that white hospital bed, the blanket wrapped tightly around him up to his chest. How quickly this thing works. His skin looks like it is beginning to melt. He has lost so much weight that it just drapes off his bones. Fleshy curtains. Painful lesions and sores cover his body but the ever proper Dr. McCoy has neatly wrapped them up so nobody would have to see the open wounds that simply would not heal and the bruises resulting from his inner hemorrhaging. But Bobby swears he can feel them still. Little plastic pipes and needles conquer the skin of his arms and the massive tubes are taped to his face for more of Hank's tests so that you can barely even see a face at all anymore, let alone recognize it. In fact, his face became unrecognizable a long while ago.

But Bobby doesn't need to see a face. And it is kind of sad to him that at times he doesn't recognize the kid. That he has to be reminded. That visits feel so obligatory because in the end he is just some stranger. But he isn't just some stranger is he? The two grew up together. They're all Bayville has left of the New Mutants. He was what Bobby came back for, for a sense of home. And Bobby was the one that did this to him.

But nobody can really see the condition the kid was in. Not from behind that protective glass or the visors of their own containment suits. He's too far gone. Too much of a hazard to the rest of them. Too contagious. Bobby supposes that is the upside to the situation. Nobody really has to see what's going on. Good for you Bobby. The power of positive thinking and all. He wants to go in and hold his hand just like someone had done to him once as he lay sick in a hospital bed. Jamie was like his brother after all. He'd never had a brother before.

But this isn't Jamie. This is James.

Right?

_Come on Bobby. You know that's not true. Sure call him James if it helps but you know just as well as everyone else, this is Jamie. Remember? What a tattle that kid was. How he ruined your first kiss with Jubilee? Oh yeah, the horrible things you guys used to make him do. Like your advice for his first date. 'Manly scent.' He didn't shower for a week! His poor date. What use is it now anyway? You left Bobby. For five years. You don't get to show up now and pretend you were his best friend. Look at him lying there practically unconscious. As if you even once thought about the Institute while you were out partying in LA. And did you forget? How you were the one that did this to him? How you were the one in charge that day? You sent him out there, Bobby. You were supposed to protect him. He trusted you. You're despicable. You don't deser –_

Bobby jerks his head quickly forcing the thoughts from his head. "How's it going Hank?" Like he needs to ask.

"He's dying." The doctor says bluntly, sighing, "Slowly and painfully dying."

Bobby stays there long after Hank leaves to do his things, run his life. He continues to watch but he no longer sees.

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

James' eyes flutter for just a second, not nearly long enough for him to pick up anything from the outside world. He moans slightly. "Dr. McCoy?" and in a dream state he adds, "I don't feel too good."

"James?" Instruments clatter as the good doctor rushes to his patient's side. "James?" James' eyes have already rolled inside his head. Hank doesn't keep the demeanor of doctor very long as his emotions take over. He grabs the boy that he's lived with for the past 7 years, the boy that's become a vital member of his family, by the shoulders and pulls him from the bed with a strength he forgot he had. He shakes him vigorously, various tubes and needles pulling away from their place on his skin, as his vision blurs. They're pointless now anyways. And he yells at the kid whose monitored brain functions show he's stopped listening. "Wake up. James! Jamie!"

"Jamie?" A young woman with honey golden hair stands before him. Her features are radiant and her skin glows. The bright sunlight above them shines such an aura around her.

She is perfect. She is an angel. A goddess. "Paige?"

She smiles at his voice. In his confusion he doesn't notice. "Where am I?"

"Welcome to Hicksville Madrox." She takes his hand in hers. "Population: us."

He looks around at his surroundings. Takes a deep breath. It doesn't hurt anymore, to take a breath. All of a sudden nothing matters. He has no worries. No concerns. Things just feel right and he is happy.

The smell of grass is sweet in his lungs and satisfying to his soul. The sun caresses his face like a warm hand. Trees dot the far horizon where they cannot bother him if they tried. That's all there is for as far as he can see. Grass, trees, sun, them. "Wow, Paige, it's so much nicer than I ever imagined."

"Is it?"

"Yes." He turns to face her. "It's perfect. I don't ever want to leave."

Paige places a cheek gently on Jamie's shoulder and a hand at his elbow as the fingers of her other hand interlace with his to become one. "Then don't."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

"What do you have for us Hank?"

Hank looks down at the beige colored folder in his blue hands. It's labeled with a simple J.M.2. James Madrox the second. He holds the papers so carefully in his large grasp. As if he is holding the child himself. "I'm afraid he's fallen into a coma, Charles. The scans indicate some light brain activity, but chances are slim that he'll be waking up anytime soon..." He holds out on the rest for a moment. The smallest bit of hope in an utterly hopeless situation. But Charles already knows. Just as he has known for such awhile now.

"If ever."

* * *

I know I haven't really been pushing for it but I'd really appreciate a review or two. Next chapter? First there was birth, then came life, and finally we get...


	7. the death of James Madrox

**Chapter 7:** the death of James Madrox

He wears an oversized green jacket for comfort, though it's the middle of a very hot global warmed summer. The way it wraps around his body, he likens it to a warm embrace. It's the only jacket large enough to do so that he hadn't packed away with his winter snow gear. There are six yellow circles sewn to the front, three on either side of the zipper, all connected by little cloth bridges. It was his final project for last semester's home economics class. He received an A. Man, how long ago that seems. Long ago and pointless as he knows now that all grades are. But it feels good, doesn't it.

"Excuse me, son, is this seat taken?" an old man asks motioning to the empty spot beside him on the park bench. _Son._ The word is loaded with meaning and it makes Jamie feel good, comfortable almost. It's a word reserved for fathers and ministers and it's been a long time since anyone's used it with Jamie.

He looks up at the old man with his back just starting to hunch over and his thin white hair hardly visible in the brightness of the day. "No," he answers simply. His voice comes out crackly from disuse. His face is dirty and his eyes puffy and red. Is this because he cried in the shower that morning or because he can't remember sleeping the night before?

The old man sees it in him. Anyone caring to look can. "Something wrong?" His voice cracks as well but from old age. He lands his rear end ungracefully onto the bench and the wooden slats beneath him shift from his weight. "Are you having a bad week?"

"Bad week?" Jamie scoffs. "Bad life."

"I'm sorry to hear that."  
"I'm sorry to live it."

There's silence for awhile. The two of them just sit there together. From behind it's almost a Norman Rockwell-ian kind of picture. An old man and his grandson. They share a park bench contemplating the similar resonance of their lives despite the six decade gap between them. Both are oblivious to the hubbub of the children frolicking nearby.

"Is there anything I can do?" the old man asks.

"Not unless you can turn back time," Jamie jokes. It's been a long time since he's joked.

"I wish I could," the old man answers lamentably, like he has regret in his own long life. Something he's done. Someone he's hurt. It makes it harder to know that there are mutants out there. To know that somebody might be able to turn back time when he never will. "I know of a place though," he continues with his previous warmth. The change in tone is lost on Jamie. "Somewhere you can go if you need it. A place for guidance."

Guidance? Like a church? Jamie looks at the old man. A thought flashes through his mind that the man must be both a father and a minister. "I don't know if I believe in God," he answers truthfully. It's not conversation. It's a confession. And in that way it is refreshing.

The old man smiles a kind whimsical smile at Jamie's innocence. "That's okay." He stands to better reach into a pocket and pull out what looks like a simple white business card. "Just take my card. If you ever need a warm meal or a place to stay or even someone to talk to, just call." He hands Jamie the card and Jamie's hand unconsciously takes it. "I'm sure we can be of service." And just as suddenly as he came, he begins to walk away. Jamie watches the old man shrink down the pathway through the trees until he can no longer be seen. He doesn't notice as his hand almost with a mind of its own slips the little card unnoticed into his green pocket.

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

_We think you should come Jamie. We think it's important. We don't want you to regret it later._

We. That's what they said to him but what the hell did they know anyways? And stupid Jamie following along anyways. Stupid. Idiot. So here he is. Doing what exactly no one really knows. Dying he supposes. Just a couple of yards and a sheet of very thick glass away from his other self as they try the only treatment they have left. If it can be called a treatment at all.

He curls himself into a ball on the chair rocking slightly to force the time to pass. His face in his knees he hugs his legs with both arms tightly. Eyes clenched shut. He can't bear himself to watch. A hand is placed caressingly on his back. He doesn't care whose it is.

_Beep. Beep. Beep._ Damn. If he could just close his ears. Then maybe it would be like he isn't there at all. That it isn't happening at all. And he tries. Tries to will his ears shut because his hands are incapacitated at the moment. He can't remember where he left them. But he can't think about that now. He can't think of anything while he could still hear the noises. _Beep. Beep. Beep._ Those damn noises.

The world is dark for him. Dark with sound.

_He's convulsing! I can't get it in. Hold him down. What's going on?_

Like a dream.

_EEEEEEEEE! Hank we're losing him. Do something! Don't you think I'm trying? Try harder. CRASH! Dammit! It's no good. He's gone._

And it echoes in his head. _He's gone. He's gone._

It's over.  
Relief?

No.

BAM!

The scenes of the past few months of James' life fly by him like he's watching in fast forward but there are little things that stick with him. Small moments that take their time. Little things that last after even those moments are gone.

BAM!  
The taste of chocolate.  
The explosion blows by him as he ducks. It's much smaller than he realized. It's over so quickly and he's fine which is why it's so weird that he blacks out only after the building stops moving. Then the movement starts again but this time because of the thunderous footsteps of Beast and the gang racing through the abandoned hallways. All his friends. He doesn't know how long he was out. The only thing he's got is the sickly sweet taste of the gas. Wait. Gas? It's like the chalky fundraiser chocolate his mom gave him as a kid to drown out the taste of medicine. And he sees them now. Dr. McCoy and Angie and Josh and is there someone in the background? He can't tell. And there beside them he sees himself, another dupe maybe. There's a look on his face that gives him a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

BAM!  
The feeling of boredom.  
He can't believe how bored he is. How nobody comes to see him. Is this because the real Jamie won't let them? Real Jamie. He is a real Jamie. Just wait till he gets better and he'll give them all a piece of his mind, even real Jamie. At least Bobby had given him that TV. James was surprised at first. It's Bobby's Power Rangers TV. He guesses he can play video games or something to pass the time but his mind isn't really in it right now. He's suddenly very tired. A nap sounds good. Yes, a nap.

BAM!  
The sound of a voice.  
Hank McCoy doesn't seem that old and out of touch when you get to know him. Sure he talks a lot (in fact, he's droning on now) and most of it is about stuff Jamie, er James, has never heard of but he has passion. He's never met someone with quite so much of it. Scratch that. He lives in a house of teenagers and hormone fueled passions. Suddenly he misses Paige.

BAM!  
The ticking of a metronome.  
The bed is starting to hurt under his left shoulder. His whole arm needs to be stretched. There's not a lot he can do about it until he can get someone's attention to help him move. He decides to try and pass the time until then. He uses the various noises of the instruments in the room like a mechanical metronome and Beast's voice as a bass for the beat boxing he does in his head. He sucks at it.

BAM!  
The touch of a hand.  
His world is dark again. It's like he's floating in it. The darkness is all part of him. His memories and the people he knew. His philosophies on life and his purple stuffed teddy bear. He feels a tightness around his chest like a big hand is holding him. It's pulling him away. Pulling him away from everything he knows. From everything he is. And he sees it. That bright light at the end of the tunnel only it's not what others had told him. It's the glow of the sun through yellow strands of hair.

And just as he was pulled away then, it all pulls away from him now. Every thought, every memory, every feeling, leaving only a wisp behind that it once was there. A reminder so that he will always know just what it is that he lost. That feeling is unimaginable. But even it is quickly overshadowed by the pain his body feels as he begins to come to. Though this is only a memory of what his body had just gone through. His skin burns as if it had just been on fire and his muscles quiver and ache from the convulsions that landed him on the hard tile floor. It was everything James had just gone through. How unbearable it must've been for him.

"Jamie? Jamie?" The sound of his name is so comforting. Jamie not James. He needs to make sure he's not the one that died. Or is he? What was it he went through if it was not death?

Jamie feels Josh's warm hands on his face working his magic. They're moist with sweat. How long had they been there? "There's nothing I can do." Josh concedes. "It's like there's nothing wrong with him." There is something wrong with him but Josh can't fix a broken soul.

Jamie's eyes begin to flutter open. "Oh, Thank God," he hears from Angie's quivering voice. Is she crying? But she was always so tough. So unfeeling.

"Jamie, are you okay?" comes a deeper voice.

Jamie tries to sit up but he needs help. "I don't know. What happened?"

Jamie looks around at them all a little confused. Their faces differ but it's like he's speaking to one large entity. As if the whole world is split into two teams. All the James A. Madroxes (though there's only the one now) and them.

"We thought maybe you died."

"But I did. Didn't I?"

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

"Professor, he's missing."

Bobby barges into the Professor's office where a private meeting is being held with Wolverine to welcome Alex Summers, the newest Junior Squad Leader of the X-Men's gold team and baby brother to Scott Summers, back to the Institute. There were already rumors flying about the school that he had been recruited to take the place his brother had left behind nearly a year ago. Founded or not, it seemed a spit in the face to Bobby that the other residents thought it plausible, the students that were supposed to look up to him. Though lately he was more than unsure he even wanted the position anymore. He sees the three of them there now and it bothers him beyond belief that he was not told, but he's quick to remember his priorities.

"What?" comes Logan's gruff voice.

"It's Jamie. All his stuff, everything is here. It's just him."

"He's gone," the Professor says matter-of-factly after doing a quick mental search of the grounds.

The Professor's too proper and composed for Bobby's liking. "Well, we've got to find him. Use Cerebro or something," he orders decidedly. It doesn't even trigger that he's never even ordered a member of the senior staff around before, let alone the great benefactor himself.

"And do what?" the Professor asks brusquely. The situation bothers him more than he lets on. He already knows he's failed Jamie, just as he had with Evan and with Jean. "I can only find him when he uses his powers and we both know he won't be creating any dupes for a long time." He calms down a bit. It's a frustrating situation yes, but there's no need to take his anger out on Bobby. "He'll come back when he's ready and all we can do is be here for him when he does."

"What?" The reaction surprises Bobby. "That's all you're going to do? Hope he comes back?" The Professor was supposed to be like a father to every student at the Institute, including Jamie and himself. Had he gone missing, Bobby was sure his own real father would be the first one out searching for him. _That_ is the kind of family Jamie needs. "Fine. I'm going to the cops."

"Whoa there, Frosty," warns Wolverine. He's been on the wrong side of the authorities one too many times before. "Think about it. When they come in here asking questions, how are you going to explain what just happened? What are you going to tell them about why he left or for that matter why we have his dead body downstairs? Besides, he's eighteen. That makes him an adult. There's nothing you _can_ do." It irks him because Bobby knows he's probably right. It's like staging an intervention for an addict. You can have the best damn intervention ever, but what good is it if the addict still doesn't want to quit?

"Fine," he concedes as he walks out the door but he adds stubbornly, "I'm still going out to look for him."

Alex follows him out but keeps one foot in the Professor's office to keep the door open for himself. Bobby forgot the meeting wasn't over. "Hey, the Professor knows what he's doing. Jamie probably just needed to clear his head, y' know." He talks about Jamie like he knows him. Like he'd been around for the whole damn thing and the only thing that betrays it is the fact that there's optimism in his voice. It's too soon for there to be hope. "But if you want I can come with you."

"Yeah, Alex, sure." The last thing Bobby wants is for Alex to tag along, but it isn't about him. "I could use the help."

It's about Jamie.

* * *

A/N: His jacket is supposed to look like his costume from the comics. I actually have one just like it that I made one day when I was bored.


	8. finding Jamie

**Chapter 8:** finding Jamie

Josh comes to the double gates of the Institute's entrance and with a hand on one of the bars he begins stretching for his run. School is going to begin in a few weeks and Josh needs every day until then to prepare for the team tryouts for whatever team he would end up joining. He wasn't sure which sport was his yet, but he was definitely born for some kind of sport. And it didn't hurt to look nice for the ladies either.

Every morning before Danger Room, Josh and eager to please newcomer Alex Summers would enjoy the challenge of a friendly 2-mile competition around town. Not a competition of the race variety per se but rather a who-can-attract-more-female-attention competition. Seeing as how Alex was nearly six years older than Josh, an accomplished tanned surfer, and usually ran shirtless, it seems safe to say he was in the lead.

For Josh, this was the guise at least. Though he didn't want to admit it, James' ill-fated summer had been hard on them all. It's easy not to live that life when you feel the wind blow the dirt off your face and watch the trees fly by like a movie powered by the strength of your own legs. The sweat of his body washes off his pain, his guilt.

This day as Josh stretches his hamstrings in the relentless New York summer sun waiting for Alex he notices a man sitting just outside the safety of the Institute gates. His oversized filthy green-tinted jacket hangs loosely on him despite the near 100 degree weather. He sits slouched with his head in his arms and a foul damp scent wafting off him. The man probably hadn't eaten in days and definitely hadn't showered.

"Hey!" Josh calls as he comes through to the homeless man's side. "This is private property. You can't be here." There's no response from the man though Josh can see him breathing so he knows at least he's living. "Come on. This is a school. Get out of here." Still no response. "What? You want some money?" Josh reaches into his tight pocket and pulls out what little change he carries. After separating away the quarters for laundry he throws the rest of the pity change on the floor with a force fueled by his misplaced contempt causing them to scatter away.

Startled, the man begins to look up and Josh supposes it's in response to his disrespectful demeanor but figures at least that way the man would've learned a lesson. But he doesn't expect the man to look up and not be a man at all. Just a boy with the tiniest hints of patchy scruff on his face and brown in his eyes. It's Jamie. The remaining coins in Josh's hand drop to the floor as he takes off to the Institute screaming for help the entire time.

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

Bobby, dressed in his Sunday's best, leans his back against the wall and stares off to nothing in particular. He just felt so tired lately. Too tired to stand if he didn't have to. But that was the problem wasn't it? That he had to.

"He didn't attend the funeral."

"I know." His companion, Charles Xavier, 'stands' stoic beside him, but there's something in his voice that Bobby can't quite make out and for a quick moment he fantasizes of being a telepath so that for once he could know what his mentor is truly thinking. But the thought quickly fades like a dream after breakfast leaving behind only a glimpse of curiosity at what trivial thing his conscious brain had just missed out on, though honestly speaking Bobby cares little.

"And he still hasn't said a word."

"At least he came back. It's a step." Are you this pathetic Bobby? That people have turned to menial vague clichés to reassure you thinking it might actually work?

"I don't know," he sighs. But it is comforting isn't it? If only a little. "There's something else that's been bothering me. How did Hank know?"

"Know what?"

"Right after the explosion. How did he know to keep them from merging? And how did he know that everything else would die when James did?"

"That's something you're going to have to ask Hank, though I can tell you now the answer involves scientific deductions and large words I'm not qualified enough to understand. I'm just thankful that he did know. He saved Jamie's life."

"I guess you're right." A long silence settles between them though the conversation is not over. There are things still that need to be said. "What are you thinking?" Bobby finally asks.

"I'm thinking he should get away from all this. No more missions, no more powers, no more reminders of what he lost simply because of who he was." Xavier's voice comes across a little louder as he turns to Bobby, "he needs a break," almost as if he really needs the boy's consensus.

It's the first time in Bobby's near decade connection with the man that the Professor's really needed anything from him. He doesn't think he likes that feeling. But he gives his answer anyway, because whether the old man wanted it or not, they both knew he had an opinion and he was going to give it. "I'm thinking he should go to Muir."

"Muir? Really? You put a lot of faith in Moira."

Bobby turns to look at the Professor for the first time in their entire exchange. There's the smallest hint of a smile on the man's lips. He's not really known for his ability to mention Moira straight-faced. It makes Bobby happy to see a glimpse of the man's teenage years. He must've been such a flirt back in the day. Bobby returns it with a smile of his own as he turns back to stare at the nothingness before them. "Shouldn't I?"

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

Jamie stares out the huge windows of the airport. Planes galore. Tons (as in a measurement of weight) and tons of steel masterfully crafted to hold thousands of gallons of explosive fuel designed to soar miles above the Earth's surface and all at the hands of some drunken pilot. But for some reason that doesn't seem all that important now. It does beg the question though: If not now, when he was about to board one of those little death traps for a 6 or 7 hour long flight on a trip straight across the Atlantic where if something were to go wrong his charred little body would probably be eaten by some whale, then when?

His plane is the little one. He guesses that people just don't go to Scotland much. It isn't like Paris. Or Illinois. What do they have anyways? The Loch Ness Monster? Or is that Ireland? If it is Scotland, he'd have to get Rahne to check it out with him. Even though with his luck, it'll probably turn out to be some mutant cow or something. Bitten by a radioactive leech.

Do they have leeches in Scotland? Do they have cows?

"Now boarding Continental Airlines Flight 620 lines G through K."

Jamie turns. He is a J. Look at that. J, Jamie. A couple of weeks ago he would've found himself thoroughly amused by that. He lives for the little things. Or lived at least.

He reaches down for his duffle bag carry on only to find it hovering some two or three feet above the floor where he left it. He almost forgot Bobby is there with him still.

Bobby pulls on the strap of the bag and carefully slips it over Jamie's shoulder for him ruffling his sleeve higher to show the bad tan Jamie had somehow accumulated inside the house this summer. "Now take care of the girls for me. Barney too of course." Bobby says and Jamie half expects the man to fix an imaginary tie on his collar and give him a kiss before he went back inside to tend to the children and start making supper. "Tell them I said hi," he continues, knocking Jamie out of his warped 60's nuclear family daydream because Lord knows it wouldn't be Jamie that continued. Both mutants stare at each other awkwardly neither knowing the right social protocol for such a situation. Suddenly, Bobby has his arms wrapped warmly around the other as Jamie simply stands there coldly wishing the moment to be over. "And you be good to Rahne." The deep vibrations so close to his ear make him shiver. Sweet nothings. "She's like a sister to me." He pushes away and holds Jamie by the shoulders. Their eyes connect briefly. Jamie gives a quick nod of compliance if only because it feels obligatory. Just like living lately felt obligatory. "Well? What are you still doing here squirt? You miss this flight and Xavier's gonna make _you_ pay for the next one."

And as Bobby watches the kid board the plane from where security forced him to wait he plasters his most convincing smile across his face. He wonders if he looks sixteen again. Jamie raises one last hand in farewell from afar.

Then he was off.


	9. hi bounce pinky

Disclaimer: I just want to emphasize that I do not own any of these characters. They are all property of Marvel and I guess that means Disney too now.

* * *

**Chapter 9:** hi bounce pinky

**Bayville, New York  
****Present Day**

It's normal for the staff and students alike not to enjoy this process. Their weekly meetings with the Professor usually involve a lot of awkwardness. What else can you expect from having to go over your personal and professional inadequacies with your boss and headmaster in front of your rival peers? And it took quite a bit of time too. Lately however, it's been the Professor that's come to dislike his meetings with junior squad leaders Iceman and Havok, with their jealous rivalry often hijacking the purpose of the sessions. The Professor understands the situation but his patience wanes as Bobby's adult tantrums begin to hurt more and more of the people he's supposed to protect.

The Professor takes a deep breath before he continues. "I'd like for Elixir, Josh," he adds as if they weren't sure to which Elixir he was referring, "to start sitting in on Gold Team training sessions with you Alex."

Alex sits up a little straighter at the honor in large contrast to Bobby's slouch, "Oh, that'd be great." Bobby rolls his eyes at his brown-nosing companion. "But he's on Bobby's team. Shouldn't…"

"What's the problem Alex? Can't handle a little babysitting without big brother Scotty holding your hand?" Bobby's proud of himself for coming up with that one on the fly. Prouder than he has been in a long time. Alex hadn't even tried to counter though Bobby can see the anger in his eyes. Like with many younger siblings, Alex hates for his accomplishments to be referred to his older brother.

This high point of Bobby's is regrettably a low one for the Professor. At one time, not too long ago, the Professor had a lot of respect for his former student. Bobby had stepped up over the events of the last summer and the Professor saw such potential in him. The kind of potential he had not seen since Scott Summers, long time leader of the X-Men. Maybe that's why the Professor had given him so many second chances, up until now. "Might I remind you Robert, you are already on probation. Anymore of this behavior and I might be forced to relinquish the Blue Team to the sole leadership of the senior advisors," he warns yet again. Bobby's already heard it all before. "As for Josh, I am hoping to eventually transfer him completely to the Gold Team."

"What?" This gets Bobby's attention. It's almost an insult, like he isn't good enough, especially to be told in this way, in front of Alex. "You didn't tell me this."

"No, I haven't. It was Josh that asked to be removed from the Blue Team. I had hoped that he would be the one to give you the news."

Alex chuckles. "Maybe he did and Bobby was just too damn drunk to remember." He turns to look at Bobby. "Not that you're any better when you're sober. Or don't you remember that either? Something about a year you spent at Muir and what was the other? Oh yeah, losing that kid you were responsible for."

It's a low blow for Bobby. He doesn't stand idly by for long as he grabs Alex by the shirt and with one quick motion, pulls him from his chair and shoves him up against the far wall. He pins Alex's shoulders with his left forearm and he ices his right fist as it hangs threateningly in front of the other's face, ready to strike. It looks like something he must've learned from Wolverine.

"You know, there's one guy I wouldn't mind losing." He inches closer until he can smell the light musky scent of Alex's body wash. "Do I look drunk to you now?" he mutters menacingly.

"No." Alex's hands glow orange underneath Bobby's grasp and no one in the room anticipates what comes next. Alex grabs Bobby's shirt and lets his powers go. Bobby flies through the air and lands hard on the floor in front of the Professor's massive desk. He grabs his stomach as he fights to regain his breath. No real damage other than his smoking tattered shirt that singes where it touches Bobby's skin. Alex is good at control. He takes pride in that among so many other things. "You look like you're on the floor," he smirks as he towers over the other mutant, arms folded across his chest.

"That's enough!" comes the booming voice of Charles Xavier and both boys are surprised by this for a moment. They forgot where they were.

Bobby recovers quickly though and takes the opportunity of a distracted Havok. He lunges at him, icing as he goes and sucker punches him in the jaw with a soggy CRACK.

Pup. Pup. The sound of the blood dripping from Alex's nose is muted against the rug but it stains as red as ever. He wipes at it roughly with the cuff of his sleeve. There's a sickening smile hidden behind the back of his bloody hand as if he almost enjoys the pain.

"Get out," the Professor orders. It's barely audible almost as if he had said it without his voice at all, but it's all that's required.

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

**Muir Island**

The students of the MacTaggert School tend to gather in the recreation room. There are tables for homework and comfortable couches. The big TV however is only wheeled in for special events unlike the similar rec room of the Bayville Academy. TVs don't promote teenage communication and imagination the same way the lack of TVs does.

For the most part they're all in there today. Rahne helps Sooraya with her math homework at the back table while simultaneously keeping an eye on Claudette scribbling away in her notebook. Arlee and Nicole are on the couch with their backs to the table _not_ talking with each other after their big disagreement, whatever it was. They're relationship is a contentious one. They spend so much time avoiding each other that the other residents can never quite figure out when the two had been in the same room long enough to have another of their famous fights. Barnell sits across from them in the armchair set to an angle to catch the tiny glimpses of incoming sunlight. His history book is open on his lap but his eyes elsewhere.

Illyana comes to the entrance of the room with her hands full, Gordon's hand in one and a small red ball in the other. "Hey guys. It stopped raining so Gordon wanted to go throw a ball around." Illyana tosses the ball into the couch circle. "Any takers?"

The ball bounces around from student to student, Arlee to Barnell to Nicole and so forth.

"Sure." Arlee begins to pack up her things. "I'll come."

Barnell standing now to better bounce the ball on the floor and catch it laughs, "Careful, Arlee, you don't wanna crush the squirt."

She laughs a sarcastic laugh back. "That's so funny coming from the egg layer."

Barnell catches the ball and takes bad aim at Arlee before shooting it with all the strength he can force onto the ball. "Buck you." The little red thing flies through the air ominously from Beak's long taloned hand in the kind of perfect arc you only see in middle school math problems with Arlee nowhere in sight.

From the corner of her eye Rahne sees it and manages to duck quickly the ball missing her completely and nailing the plastic foliage behind. The unfortunate vase teeters on its stand though nobody notices this as Rahne raises her head to offer a visibly lupine face, fangs and all.

In two quick steps the beast makes it to the top of the couch from where she lunges over the heads of two noticeably frightened teenage girls. She pounces on Beak knocking him to the ground with a hard THUD. Her claws pierce into the loose fabric of his clothes and she pulls his upper half nearly two feet off the ground and only inches away from her open snarling jaws.

CRASH. The vase's balance finally gives way to the forces of gravity.

Beak's eyes are closed as tightly as he can make them and his feeble arms cover his face in a vain attempt to ward off his inevitable death by jaws or he would've noticed the consequent flick in Rahne's eyes upon the distraction. Slowly Wolfsbane fades into Rahne in a series of flashes to and from wolf and human states as if she were in an 80's B-movie horror flick. As far as anyone knows, she hadn't changed like that since the earliest days of her mutation.

Rahne is human now. Beak can tell because it feels like a hundred pounds have just been lifted from his pelvis where she sits. He braves a look as he squints through the gaps between his feathered arms.

"Oh, Barn," she says quietly with so much concern and solace it sounds like plain pity. "I'm so sorry."

Beak pulls his arms away from his face only slightly but Rahne does not let up her grasp on him. She then gets a different look on her face. One that Beak has seen before but can't exactly place. She quickly turns her head to the side and embarks in Beak's next worst nightmare, she pukes right beside him, Beak bobbing along with every convulsion just as scared as when he thought Rahne was going to bite his head off.

And then, a still silence.

"Come on, Rahne." Nobody in the room can remember where Sooraya comes from. She puts her hands on Rahne's shoulders and Rahne looks at her through the tears she's forced out of her clenched eyes and her face pale as the wall behind her. "Rahne, let go of Barnell."

Dust eases the girl's palms open revealing the little bloody cuts they received from her clawed Herculean grip. Beak unprepared falls back to the floor failing to catch himself, the front of his sweatshirt in tattered red stained frays. "That's good. Good," Sooraya coaxes in such a soothing motherly fashion the occupants of the room would be shocked if they had any shock left over in them. "Okay? Okay let's go." Dust places a hand weightlessly on one of Rahne's arms, the other around her back and on her far shoulder as she guides the dazed girl out of the room.

"See kids." Illyana assumes her caretaker role and chides jokingly with her arms crossed in front of her chest from the entranceway breaking the tense aftermath before also following the two of them. "This is why we don't play ball in the hall."

There's a tiny snicker coming from the corner of the room. Barnell props himself up onto his elbows the best he can with elbows like his. "What are you smiling at?" he nods his head inquiringly to the boy.

Gordon takes his hand down from his face to show that rarely seen toothy grin hiding behind. "I know what you were thinking. It has to do with why your pants are wet… and yellow."

"Get over here you little –" Beak throws himself up from the floor as Gordon races out of the room.

"Beak, Beak," Nicole calls from the couch, a hand in front of her face to shield the image of Barnell in all his shredded, vomit covered, still dripping pant glory from her delicate, privileged eyes. "Shower, first. _Please_."


	10. doctors and scientists

**Chapter 10:** doctors and scientists

"Stupid bandage." Rahne mutters angrily under her breath as she pulls on one end of the white gauze dangling from her left palm. She tries wrapping it around again tighter and winces at the pain caused by the movement of her right.

Moira comes and sits beside her daughter on the bed taking the girl's damaged hands into her own. Her hands are cold and rough against Rahne's flushed skin after years of scientific powdered glove use. She pulls Rahne's fingers back gently to look over the pink exposed flesh of her palms before reaching for some more gauze. Rahne turns her head away from her mother like a child receiving a shot as the woman expertly and painlessly wraps the gauze around.

"They won't stay on," Rahne says almost pitifully. Helpless. She doesn't know why, but the thought of her hands and her vague memories of the incident and her overall inability to ever do anything right suddenly gives her the urge to cry. She tugs at her bottom lip with her teeth to keep it in.

"Well, we'll just have to make them stay on, won't we?" Moira comforts in her lullaby voice. An ill Rahne, no matter how infrequent, always turned their relationship back into what it was when she first found the girl all those years ago, alone, helpless, and in need of love.

"I hate this feeling."

Moira takes a worried hand to Rahne's forehead, her eyebrows crinkling. "Is the fever getting to you? It was low-grade just a moment ago. Hardly over 99."

Rahne internally rolls her eyes. She supposed that's why the compound brought in Doc Samson, to deal with the misgivings of Doc MacTaggert. Sure her mother meant well, but if Rahne was really worried about a fever she could just as easily if not more so turn to a thermometer and couple of aspirin. "No. I just… I feel so broken."

"Broken?"

"You know," she shrugs awkwardly, "weak."

Moira lovingly brushes aside a lock of Rahne's hair behind her ear letting the green of her eyes shine through. "It's part of being human."

"I'm not human," she answers in muted defiance.

"You know what I mean."

Rahne turns to the older woman. "I wish you'd just let me morph. My healing power is ten times stronger when I morph."

"I know. I know and I'm sorry, but I just like Barnell too much. I don't think I'm ready for you to murder him just yet." Not exactly the best time in the world to be joking of such matters but somehow it brings the slightest of smiles to Rahne's lips. "Now why don't you try to sleep off this little cold," Moira clears the bed of the excess medical supplies of which there are plenty. She pulls down the covers and helps her child in, kissing her red locks as she tucks her in the way Rahne always imagined a mother would do. She adds comfortingly, "and I'll be back up with some soup later, okay?"

"Hm," Rahne moans contentedly, "okay." As Moira reaches for the door, Rahne stirs. "Mum? Not chicken soup okay?"

**_ooooo_**

"Will she be alright?" Moira turns to see Gordon addressing her in the hall just beside her daughter's door. She's worried about what the child has seen and wonders how it might affect the young empath.

Behind him with hands on the young boy's shoulders stands Jamie. He can read the look on her face and offers his pseudo-explanation with a shrug, "He wanted to see her."

Moira smiles and bends down slightly to address her youngest charge. "Of course she will. Just give her a few days. She'll be fine," she says most reassuringly.

Gordon's head begins to droop and he is visibly saddened as he responds, "They're saying she can't morph anymore. That she has to stay human."

"Only until she's feeling better," Moira adds hopefully.

"That's sad."

"Sad? Why?"

"She doesn't like staying human. It makes her feel bad. Ugly." He cheers up suddenly as his head shoots up and a grin spreads across his face. "Can I see her?"

Moira stands straighter. "Only for a minute okay?" Gordon doesn't answer just bounds along cheerfully into the room.

"He's right you know. It is sad."

Moira looks at Jamie. "That she can't morph?"

"That she feels that way," he responds sincerely.

Moira's not used to this from Jamie. His and Rahne's relationship consists mainly of childish jokes and playful bickering, though Moira had seen some softer moments between the two of them. She's reminded of their long history together. "You know I created this school for her. Because she couldn't fit in as a human in Scotland and she couldn't fit in as a mutant in New York."

"I… I thought you pulled her out of Xavier's because you didn't agree with him."

"No. No. It was Rahne's choice. She begged me. And so I started my own special school. For people that just have a hard time being people."

Jamie is almost shocked by the admission. It's not the way they pictured it happening all those years ago. Not like Jubilee being pulled away from the place she belonged the most. He always knew that Rahne was special in her own way and it surprises him that he just never quite realized how much.

"Look at me," Moira catches herself though her voice still sounds so distant. "I don't know why I'm telling you any of this anyways. Unloading on you as if you were Samson." Like she's caught in a memory. She smiles her weary smile before going back to check on Barnell. "Don't let him stay in there too long. I don't want him catching anything."

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

"So this is Ohio huh?" Bobby stares out the window of the blackbird. Rolling plains, random farms, grass. "Somehow, it's exactly as I always pictured it." He looks at Paige jokingly trying to provoke a response. "Exciting." He says sarcastically while looking out the window again so Paige can't see the smile on his face.

"Give it a break." She jabs him playfully with an elbow as best she can considering how they're both buckled tightly into their seats. "It's nicer than you guys think."

"Give what a break?" he chuckles though his joke seems to only be funny to the two of them. "There's nothing out there to give a break."

Josh sits in the row behind them cut off from seeing their faces. But he hears the light-hearted affectation of their voices and sees their arms brush by each other on the armrest that they share. He watches these things quietly as his feelings fester. He knows that they're there but he doesn't completely recognize them. Anger? Jealousy? Regret? He doesn't know and he doesn't care. He just wonders how long it's going to be this time before he loses her too, like they lose everyone with ties to Bobby. Though in a way he knows he already has.

Hank's reaction is the opposite. As he focuses on piloting the jet, he is similarly unable to see the looks on their faces, but he knows just as everyone else on the plane bothering to pay the slightest bit of attention knows. Of every resident at the mansion, it's nice to see the two of them in some form or other of happiness. They deserve it. And he hates to have to break up their little exchange as they near their destination, though he does so with a smile. "We didn't exactly come here for the sightseeing," he jokes right along with them.

"Why _are_ we here?" pipes up a bored voice from the back.

Hank motions forward with his head as his hands pull the plane into a slow descent. Amidst the sea of long grasses lies a lone single story building. There are non-descript cars parked nearby though there is no paved road in sight. Both look as if they are in danger of being smothered by the overgrown foliage. It oddly brings such excitement onboard mixed with the usual anxiety that comes before a new mission. They all stare at it knowingly but Hank continues anyways. "We're here for that."

**_ooooo_**

"Stay away from her Bobby." Josh approaches from behind.

Bobby scoffs. "Excuse me?" He turns around. Josh looks like a peacock during mating season with his chest puffed out, feathers ruffled, standing tall.

"Paige." He pauses for emphasis as he takes a step forward. "Stay away from her."

Bobby rolls his eyes. This is ridiculous. Frankly, it's even a bit… childish? "What, Josh?" He approaches almost threateningly, daring him to do something. Anything. "Are you jealous?" comes the snide remark.

Josh takes a step back. It's a moment of instinctive weakness. Bobby's pleased with this. He turns.

"She's too young for you. She's a kid compared to you."

"If _she_'s a kid, what does that make you?" He jokes derisively to the high school senior over his shoulder as he walks away.

Josh fumes. "I'm not gonna let you drive her away like you did Angie."

"Hey!" He's hit a raw nerve. Bobby turns back before he even realizes what he's doing. It would be a moment of subconscious clarity almost had it not been full of pure unadulterated emotion. Had he not been lying to himself. "You leave her out of this. Angie left on her own! I never told her to go! And Paige, Paige is just a student. Just because she doesn't want _you_, doesn't mean she has anything to do with me." Bobby stops for a moment and in that moment he can feel his outrage surge through him. It's in his clenched fists and gritted teeth. He tries to will himself to release them but it's hard. "Why are you even here, Josh?"

"Trust me," Josh stands unfazed with his arms crossed at his chest. That anger he's incited in Bobby means that for all intents and purposes he's won. He speaks with almost no intonation at all. "It's not by my choice."

"That's fine." Bobby dismisses the boy and situation as best he can before proclaiming one more act as Josh's squad leader. "As soon as we get back to New York you are officially removed from this team permanently. I hope you're best friend Alex has better luck dealing with you."

**_ooooo_**

They walk through the building. This one was relatively intact. Whoever it was they were up against was getting better. Unless all of it was intentional of course. In either case the X-Men weren't any closer to figuring any of it out. The place didn't look blown to pieces like the last few. Heck, it didn't even look broken into. Just deserted. Like a ghost town. And that's what made it more disturbing than the rest. This was a smart organization. They knew what they were doing. What did it mean that they were walking through these untouched hallways? Was there nothing to hide? Did they not have enough time? Was it a clue? Or a warning?

"Bobby," Beast stops so abruptly at the doorway to the main office that Bobby almost walks into him, though it doesn't help that Bobby is still carrying with him the confrontation with Josh that occurred hardly fifteen minutes ago. "Take everyone and go back to the jet. Send Wolverine." Hank doesn't sound right. There's an edge to his voice.

"Why? What is it?" Bobby asks the man's furry back while trying someway to peer around his massive blue body. He turns around with a look Bobby had never seen on someone so much older than himself before. It's slightly unnerving, but Hank's movement opens a small gap between the door frame and his own body and Bobby's only interest is sneaking a peek at whatever is on the other side.

And there they are. Five of them laid out one by one on the muddy grey-colored floor. They're all in lab coats or suits. Simple scientists or business people. One is old and has hair like his grandfather's. Hands tied behind their backs, face down. Blindfolded. Dead.

"Now, Bobby." Hank interrupts his thoughts and Bobby doesn't need to be told again. He runs from the building as quickly as he can. He can't totally remember what he's supposed to do. He just knows he has to get out of there. He has to get as far away from that image that's now burned into his brain as he can. Suddenly a hand grabs his arm from nowhere. Bobby looks back to its owner, his face still uncontrollably contorted by the rush of emotions and thoughts filling his little brain.

"Bobby, what is it?" Paige says thoroughly concerned despite the constant reassuring qualities of her voice. None of it triggers though. His mind is still fighting. Fighting itself and anything else it can possibly pit itself against. How can he possibly explain what he himself doesn't understand?

"They're dead," is all he says, though he knows he shouldn't.

Stupid recon missions. Hadn't the X-Men learned anything? Dammit. This isn't what it used to be about.


	11. He wants to go home

**Chapter 11:** He wants to go home.

"Where will you go?" Paige leans a shoulder against the frame of Bobby's door. It's nearly identical to the way Angie would wait to no avail for him to come to his senses. The way Paige did herself during her first real encounter with him. Her voice is insecure. That's unusual.

"Los Angeles." Bobby answers without hesitation, without looking up. How long had he been contemplating his escape? He grabs another handful of loosely folded boxers and roughly jams his fist into the bottom of one of the few duffel bags and suitcases strewn across his bed.

"For Angelica?"

"No," he answers with more than a hint of agitation in his voice. "And either way, I don't think that's any of your concern."

With hesitation, she dares to enter a little further. "I don't think you should go."

"And why not?" he asks exasperated. Go ahead Paige. Enlighten him. He's waiting.

"Isn't that where it happened? Before?"

"Where what happened?" he questions annoyed.

"Where you tried to hurt yourself."

"What?" Bobby answers in a manner that is overtly calm. "I don't know where you got that from but…"

"That's why you went to Muir in the first place isn't it?" she interjects.

"Rumors, Paige." He shakes his head patronizingly at the girl's gullibility with a slick smile at her innocence. "Rumors."

"Don't treat me like an idiot Bobby. People only go to Muir if there's a reason. A real reason."

Bobby stops everything and stares at the girl seriously, eyebrows furrowed. "You're out of line Guthrie," he warns.

"It's true isn't it?"

Unable to contain his anger he points at the door, "Get out of my room."

"No," she answers emphatically her emotion getting the best of her. "Maybe I wasn't there for Jamie when he needed it, but I was here for you and don't you try to deny that."

"You don't know what I've been through," he counters, "what I saw."

"And you don't know what I've been through Bobby," Paige fights back forcefully with just a hint of excess moisture in her otherwise stoic eyes. It was true. What did he know? He'd been so wrapped up in himself and his own pain that he never stopped to think about how his selfishness was causing harm onto those he was supposed to care for, whether it was the students on his team or friends like Angie. People like Paige. "I was here for you," she reiterates softly.

Bobby dumps the bag in his hand onto the floor with reckless abandon and walks up to her deliberate and strong. She stands her ground defiantly. "Well nobody asked you to be," he barks with voice raised and gestures emphatic. "When are you going to get it Paige? I'm not yours to fix. I don't want you. I don't even _like_ you." Bobby knows how to make it hurt. "You're just a kid. A little girl with pigtails in her hair," he wraps a finger in one of her golden flowing locks and tugs at it ever so lightly in such a demeaning way. Her arms are crossed in front of her denying her body the freedom to react with the emotion she feels. Bobby's face nears her ear and he whispers maliciously, his warm breath sending shivers down her back, "You like living in fantasy worlds? Go find Josh. He'd love to have you." He turns his back to her. "I'm done."

Paige closes her eyes and slowly turns from the man before opening them again. "He was right," she says quietly never expecting to utter these words. "You are a bastard Bobby Drake."

**_ooooo_**

He looks drunk but he's not. Not really. Not yet anyway. If he cared at all, that thought would've scared him almost as bad as his next, that he was starting to look, and smell, like Logan. He runs his little finger around the wet rim of the shot glass. He could almost hear the squeak of the glass over the overarching buzz of barroom noise as it vibrated through his pinky. You'd think this place would be Logan's nightmare with all the sounds and the low light and the smell that makes you want to gag with regular senses. Yet, he was still in here at least once a week. And he didn't even have the added bonus of having that cat piss he paid money for and swallowed down give him any bit of a buzz.

The bartender comes by. He must recognize Bobby by now just like the guy at the door that stopped asking for his ID a few months back. Or maybe in his current state, he's finally stopped looking like that 17-year old baby face. "You want another?"

Bobby didn't even realize his glass was empty. He doesn't bother checking as he pushes the glass to the man as far as his fingers will allow without lifting his elbow off the table. If the bartender tells him it's time for a refill, then dammit it's time for a refill. He assesses his actions, as the drink pours rather majestically into the dirty little glass, quickly gauging how much more he can stomach, how much more he should stomach, but the fact that he can still think about it tells him he's got a long way to go before this night is up.

He wonders what this means psychologically speaking. If maybe he doesn't want to be thinking. So it's comforting in a way that his thoughts circle his head like water down a drain. Short glimpses of what his life once was and what it now is. A demented parody. 'This is your pathetic life, Bobby Drake as hosted by the pathetic Bobby Drake.' Almost.

A random snippet of naming his pet hamster Scruffy because he really wanted a dog instead and his parents were jerks for making him settle, then down the drain, gone. Throwing mud balls at Alicia Beckett in her puffy pastel dress while she ran away crying, gone. Lining up his bed with the window so he could sneak out whenever he wanted to, not that he ever did, gone. Shaving a bald spot on Ray's head on a dare and the burns he received afterwards, gone. The look on Amara's face when he made fun of her dress the night of senior prom, gone. The argument he had with Jubilee about how he followed her to Los Angeles and now she was talking about leaving him, gone. The juxtaposition of his warm blood leaking out of his cold wrist, dark red against his pale skin, gone. Sneaking into the girls' bathroom with Gordon and Barnell to ice the floors of the showers, gone. Making up for Amara's prom by taking Claudette to her own, gone. The Professor on the phone offering him a position on the staff, gone. Playing basketball with Jamie and four of his dupes, gone. Laughing at Paige's inability to ward off an attack by Darth Maul, down the drain… not gone? Paige buying him chocolate on a bad day even though he's allergic. Watching Paige pull an all-nighter for a chemistry exam she was going to ace anyways. Paige looking after the younger kids in their first danger room session. Pizza with Paige's favorite, pineapple and olive. Slipping on his own ice and Paige's snigger of a laugh. The pain-filled crack in Paige's voice as she called him… that_ thing_ that she called him. As she stopped believing in him. All of it. None of it gone.

"Dammit," he mutters while he takes one last shot and slams it down on the table. He knows what he's got to do now. He has to go back. For her. Even if all they do is talk. He grabs his jacket from the back of his chair hastily and pushes through the drunken crowd to the door.

"Hey kid?" the bartender yells after him but Bobby doesn't notice and soon enough he's well and gone too. "Who's gonna pay for your damn drink?"

**_ooooo_**

Bobby comes up to the building and things are odd but he can't quite place his finger on it. He blames it on the alcohol though he's far from drunk. He enters the door and as he walks through the hallway in front of him, he finds it pristine. He realizes now what the problem is though. It's empty. There's not a human sound anywhere in the building. It's quiet enough that for the first time, Bobby can actually hear the low running hum of the refrigerator. He follows the sound to the kitchen because it is the only thing he can think of to do and once through the door he finds the place in shambles. "My God," he manages to push out from his lips.

"Bobby." A man calls out and Bobby startled starts to ice himself up almost as an afterthought though had it been a real attack, he would long ago be dead. "Where have you been?" Wolverine yells out to him, the street clothes he wears shredded by means other than his claws.

Bobby is slow to lose his ice form as he gauges the situation not sure whether or not the danger has passed. "What happened?" he finally asks forgetting that the Wolverine had asked him a question to begin with.

Damn kid. Wolverine jerks his head away in defense of his sensitive nostrils to the distinctive aroma of alcohol wafting from the younger man's every pore. "What does it look like?" he answers roughly. "We've just been attacked."

**_ooooo_**

Downstairs the littlest ones were safely hidden away all wearing their pajamas. It was after all the middle of the night. No one was hurt, not really anyway, and especially not after Elixir had finished with them as he continued to do in the other room. If they wanted to hurt people, Bobby was fairly certain people would've been hurt. They were professionals. It's not easy getting past all of the mansion's securities, and mutants. They were looking for something weren't they? But what? It reminds him of, well, the office in Ohio.

"I don't know where they came from Bobby. There were so many," Havok attempts to explain the situation. Their previous contention seems so petty in light of these new circumstances. Bobby takes a quick glance around the room. Hank and Xavier attack the computers with relative newcomer and genius David 'Prodigy' Alleyne, Elixir's substitute on the blue team. Havok notices where Bobby places his attention. "They didn't hurt anyone or take anything, so now they think it was just a distraction. That the real attack was in the computers. It would explain why the alarms and security failed."

Bobby's not sure what else he should do other than stand in a corner and not be a bother to anyone else. From his vantage point he watches the three of them click away on their respective keyboards. He steals a glance at Paige just to make sure she's okay. They make eye contact briefly but Paige quickly breaks it off.

"Are you seeing this too, Hank?" he hears Prodigy ask. "It looks like they're still in the system."

"No," Hank dismisses. "That's not possible. It can't be accessed from outside our network."

They do a search of all their allies and safe houses, any place that can connect. "I think I found it." It's in the last place they look. "They're at Muir."

Bobby's ears perk up. Muir? No. Why Muir? They were just kids over there. Already damaged. There was no training on Muir. Because they were the ones that needed to be protected, protected by the X-Men. They were defenseless, powerless. If this is what happened to the X-Men during an attack from this nameless, faceless evil, there was no stopping the force on Muir. A wave of guilt washes over Bobby who could only imagine the atrocities occurring in his former home to those he still considered friends and family.

The activity surrounding the area is a flurry once again. _Why didn't they call for assistance? Who else has been hit? I can't get through. It's like they've blocked off all communications. Why are we waiting? We need to go now._

"Wait," Prodigy's one word brings them all to silence. "This style, I've seen it before. It's someone that's had access before."

"What are you saying? This is someone we know?"  
"Sure. Anything's possible when you've got a gun held up to your head."

"No," Prodigy tries again. "This one's deliberate. It's got a signature. Something about coming from – "

A southern accented "Oh my God" cuts him off mid-sentence.

"Paige?" Bobby asks.

"I know who this is. It's…"

* * *

A/N: If you've gotten this far I assume you've got an opinion. Please express it with a review. Thank you.


	12. the things you don't know

**Chapter 12:** the things you don't know

_I know who this is. It's..._

"Jamie?" Moira walks into her lab with a warm cup of coffee nestled between her cold hands, breakfast on her Saturday morning. She wasn't expecting anyone, but she can't say she's surprised. Residents of Muir don't usually follow the norm. That's why they were there. "You didn't go to the mainland with the others?"

"No," Jamie sits at one of Moira's computers diligently working away. He stops his clicking as he leans back and swivels partially to the older woman as he speaks. "Rahne asked me to be here when she came back from running her errands. She's wanted to tell me something, but you know, it's hard to be alone sometimes."

"I'm glad she's feeling well enough to go. I still didn't want her to, but she's a stubborn one."

"Trust me, I know," he half jokes as he watches the doctor's reaction to the comment. Tries to read her face. He sometimes wondered if she knew of the going-ons he had with her daughter. It's not as though they were particularly good at hiding it. Then again, there were a lot of things that happened right under Moira's nose that she had yet to figure out. "You didn't feel like going?" he asks innocently enough as he slowly returns to his work.

But Moira has no reason to believe he truly wants to know. She's lived with youth long enough to understand at least this about them. "I wanted to," she answers anyways, "but I had work to do." And then she rolls her eyes and adds an exasperated, "As always."

"Yeah," he agrees, "I know how that is." Forever typing and clicking away at that computer.

Moira takes a sip from her cup. She thinks on this a bit. "Speaking of which, I thought I gave you the weekend off." She's not often wrong.

"Oh, you did," he says with a slick smile. "This isn't for you," he adds in a dark yet playful voice that Moira hadn't heard since Jamie first began speaking again those many months ago. A puzzled look forms on the good doctor's face as Jamie's hand disappears under the protective cover of his oversized jacket and Moira notices something large shift under that familiar dark green cloth. His hand comes back out and with it comes something else. A gun. Its ominous black barrel points straight at the woman. He continues to stare at the computer screen and click, click, clicks away with his free hand. "It's for HYDRA," he adds. She might as well know what he's risking her life for. He slowly pulls back the hammer of his pistol with his thumb like an expert. Chck. It's a rather quiet sound but it doesn't betray its master's sense of looming doom.

CRASH. Fragments of ceramic litter the ground. Her favorite cup. Veins of coffee run through the small crevices between the tiles quickly spreading across the lab floor. Nobody cares. He turns to her. Finally. Though it had only been a matter of seconds it felt an eternity to the both of them. She looks confused. Scared. Such are the ways with women he supposes. Though he _does_ wonder if maybe he also looked that way when he was first faced with his own death.

"I really wished you went with the others."

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

"Paige, are you sure?" Bobby holds the girl at arms length by the shoulders struggling to read the expression on her face.

Her eyebrows furrowed, pupils darting back and forth, as she tries to make sense of what can't be made into sense. "Hicksville," she says dazed, finally raising her head to meet his. "It said it's coming from Hicksville."

"Bobby let's go," Logan rallies from behind and Bobby turns to follow but Paige stops him with a quick suddenly steady hand to his upper arm.

"I want to come."

"No. You're too close to the situation."

"It's Jamie," she counters, "We're all too close." She looks him dead in the eyes with a steely determinacy, her grip tightening ever so slightly, her voice quieter yet poised, "Let me come."

The commotion continues behind them as Logan readies the rest of the team and Hank starts up the jet. "Fine," Bobby concedes almost contemptuously.

And Logan barks his ominous orders. "Prodigy, suit up. Welcome to your first Blue team mission. Elixir, you're on stand-by here." He points to Iceman and Husk, her hand still gripped to his arm, "On the plane you two. We're going to Muir."

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

The piercing smell of coffee wafts through the air. It's a very inviting homey smell. A late Sunday morning rain outside warm inside smell. Moira sits in her favorite chair. Favorite cup, favorite chair. Her feet are bound to its legs and her wrists are tied together around the back. And tied well. Ever the Boy Scout he is. She watches him in front of her. "Jamie, this isn't you," she says. Yes, she tries to strike a chord in him. She tries to make him realize what he's doing. But also she says it because it's the truth. It's the truth and she can't understand it any other way.

"Who do you think it is?" he asks derisively and with a snort he adds, "Mystique?"

"The Jamie I know would never do a thing like this."

"Oh," he turns to her, his smile looking somehow more sinister than before as he is truly happy with the job he has done. "I'm still me Moira. I'm the only Jamie you've ever known. I guess you just didn't know me well enough." He turns back to the computer. "Honestly, that always was your problem," he says as calmly as if this were any regular conversation between the two. Breakfast in the morning discussing weekend plans and box office hopes. "Yours and the Professor's. You always thought you knew so much. You knew everything about us. About me. You thought you knew what was best," he turns to her again. "But you didn't, did you?"

"And HYDRA knows what's best?" she counters bitterly.

"No," he answers simply as if it is the most obvious answer in the world, "they know better than you."

A window pops up on the computer monitor with the long awaited results of Jamie's decryption. They both stare at it. It seems Jamie's found what he was looking for. Moira's face looks deathly pale as she realizes what's happening. "Legacy?" she asks concerned. "Listen to me Jamie, you can't take that. It can't get out," she begs desperately.

"I can," he taps a few more keys, "and I will," he adds almost jokingly.

"Is this what HYDRA wants? To take over the world this way?"

"They don't want to take over the world," he answers lightly as he rolls his eyes. Honestly, some people just watch too many B action movies. "They want to make it better."

"With biological warfare?" she responds almost sarcastically, though she had never spoken a sarcastic word in her life.

"What?" he looks at her confused then back at the screen as he scrolls through the information he's just discovered. Some of this stuff, he recognizes it. "What is this?" he asks aloud to no one in particular.

"It's a virus. It's been engineered to attack the x-gene. It works its way from powers and mutations and eventually attacks the infected individual's full genetic makeup."

He looks at the diagrams in horror. The case studies, the results. The pictures. "It kills mutants?" he asks her almost breathlessly.

"Yes," she answers simply.

"I know this," he says dreamily. "It-it killed James."

Moira turns her head to look away while she answers with a solemn, "Yes."

He turns around quickly and yells at her furiously a sudden coarseness coming through his voice, "And you knew?" He grabs the arms of her chair and pushes it back into the wall with a deep thud. Moira's face scrunches instinctively as she reels from the pain and shock upon hitting the back of her head against the wall. This was never Jamie's intention, minor as it was, though for the moment he's glad it hurts. "You knew and you didn't tell me?" he screams, his face just inches from hers.

"We wanted to," she sounds scared, but maybe that's just hopeful thinking on his part. "We did. But we couldn't risk it getting out." We. The Professor and Dr. McCoy and who knows how many others. They all knew. He lets go and steps away from the chair dazed. "The panic it would cause among mutants," she tries to explain, "and what could happen if it got into the wrong hands."

"The wrong hands? Or any hands?" He falls back down into his chair defeated. His head slumped into his arms on the table. The cool metal of his gun rests against his cheek. "They could've found a cure," he says to himself. "They could've done something."

"We're working on a cure."

This enrages him again. He swings around, grabs his gun from the desk's surface and points it at her threateningly. "Well, it's too late for me isn't it?" he yells at her his arm trembling just slightly in his rage.

"You?"

_Yes. Me._ He suddenly realizes what he's doing. Who he's pointing his gun at. Like he could ever really hurt Moira. His arm lowers slowly in front of him. "I should've known," he says softly, sounding so hurt, so betrayed. "You should've told me."

"I know."

He gasps suddenly as he turns back around to the computer in sudden realization. "Rahne," he says as his eyes grow wider in fear. "Her powers, her fever, she's infected isn't she?" he looks to Moira but doesn't expect an answer.

"What?"

"She's infected. She's fuckin' infected." Jamie paces in the small space between Moira and the computer nervously running his hands through his hair and rambling away to himself as the pieces finally begin to fall into place. Moira can only watch on in confusion. "And her healing power, that's what's staving it off isn't it? That's why it hasn't gotten bad yet."

"Jamie, you're not making sense."

"But she's contagious. She's contagious now and sooner or later it'll get her too just like it got me. And then it'll get everyone."

"Why would I infect my own daughter?"

This Jamie hears and it takes him over the top. "Because you did it to me!" he screams at her and before he knows it he hits her with the handle of his gun. Once, twice, three times. More. Until he finally realizes what he has done. Moira sits slumped over in that chair. Her forehead has a smattering of blood the size of Jamie's fist. He looks down at his hand. His knuckles stain red. He inserts the gun safely back at his waist then wipes the back of his hand roughly along his pants. What's done is done. Back to work.

* * *

A/N: This is actually the scene that I wrote this whole story for. I just had this image of Jamie with a gun and poor Moira all tied up that would not leave my brain until I came up with a whole plot for it and spent hours of my time writing it all down. I hope it was worth it. Bad Dogg, I can't thank you enough for the wonderful reviews. You are awesome. If you thought they were sad and pathetic before, I wonder what you think of them, or I guess Jamie at least, now. And to anyone else reading this, please review as well. Give me your opinions, your speculations, your expectations. I'm not opposed to constructive criticism either.


	13. in lieu of silver bullets

**Chapter 13:** in lieu of silver bullets

There's a planter right outside the front doors of the main building. Nobody pays much attention to it besides the gardener when he comes by and that's only because he gets paid for it. Oh, and Arlee threw up in it once after losing to Nicole in some drinking game. But only the two of them and Barnell know about that.

Jamie sits there now. He looks out at the empty road leading up to the compound as he waits for her. There's not much else he can do. Click. He opens his revolver. Slick. One by one pulls out all six bullets, looks at them closely and then drops them carelessly at his feet. He twirls the barrel before slipping it back in. Like Russian roulette except there are no bullets. He never thought he would make a good Russian anyways. He always wanted to be the cowboy.

It was the really evil ones that played with their guns in the movies and stuff. He always wondered why that was. And he wonders now what it means for him.

He leans over and gathers his little toys in one hand like change from a dollar. Their cute little points. One of those was going to kill someone someday. That's what they were made for. When did he get so comfortable with firearms? If only his scoutmaster could see him now. And then, Shick. Without another thought he slips them all back into their perfectly sized little holes where they're held snuggly in a metal embrace until called upon to maim or kill. If ever they are called upon.

A bird chirps in a tree. Jamie aims his gun at it so very carefully. "Bang. Bang," he says vocally while jerking the gun upward each time like a child with a cap gun. It amuses him when nothing happens. He reaches for a rock to throw but quickly thinks better of it. Too many lives have been disrupted already. He wants to leave no more of a presence here than he already has.

kkkrrrr… The sound distracts him. The way that thing roared, or clunked rather, he could hear it from a mile away. It was that crappy car they had her running around in. Nothing but the best for Moira's little girl. He quickly slips his revolver into the waist band of his pants then remembers to pull it along to his far hip. Just in case, you know. He zips up his jacket to hide its handle. He can see her now. Through the dirt of that spotted windshield. She's smiling at him.

**_ooooo_**

They sit there, together, in the wild with the trees, among the squirrels. He'd been here for about a year now and he never thought to come up here. To come here and just sit.

"It's weird being alone like this," Rahne makes her attempt at conversation. "I can't remember the last time we had the chance."

"I know."

"I know? No subtle little raunchy jokes about that last night we had together? Or was it so boring for you that you've forgotten already?"

"No," Jamie smiles cautiously. "No jokes today. And I didn't forget." He turns to her. "I can't forget."

Rahne turns away from him gently to hide the color creeping its way into her cheeks as she pictures their last night together. "Neither can I." When she looks back at him that small smile lurking on the edges of her mouth begin to fade. They smooth themselves into hints of concern instead. "What's wrong, Jamie? You look so sad." She can see it in his eyes can't she? She always could tell these things.

"No," he announces. "We've talked about me this entire year. Let's talk about you. Are you feeling better?"

"Aye, much." The clash of their accents has never sounded so prominent. And then she adds hesitantly, "Jamie, I've something to tell you."

He smiles, "So I've heard."

In a rare move, she reaches out to touch him. To hold his hand. To be closer to him. Their fingers touch. Jamie likes how this feels. He wishes they had done it before. He regrets a lot of things. Her nose scrunches a little. Jamie thinks it looks cute the way the little wrinkles form on its bridge. "You smell like coffee." And then she makes a face and jerks back suddenly. "And blood," she says. That wary ready to pounce feel of her wolf instinct wavers right below her human confusion.

"I thought you couldn't smell like that in your human form," Jamie responds nonchalantly and before Rahne can even blink an eye Jamie reaches into his jacket and she's faced with the same frightening scene her mother had experienced not so long ago.

"What are you doing?" Jamie is surprised by how calmly she's taking this. How human she is about it. Then again, she probably doesn't even realize what's happening. Rahne is simple that way. Trusting. That's part of her charm.

"What I have to do," he says deliberately as he stands slowly and backs away from his friend slightly so he can take her in, in all her glory. The barrel of the gun never wavers from her face. "On that day, when we first met, those eight years ago, did you ever think we'd end up like this?" he asks. "All those times you used to help me with my homework and keep me company when the others wouldn't take me along, did it once pass through your mind that it would be this way? You'd never believe some of the stories I could tell you. And I'm sorry to say, you won't get the chance." Chck. He cocks his gun again, hopefully for the last time.

"Jamie, no," she begs.  
"Jamie, yes," he responds darkly, mocking her almost.

His hand is steady. His face is a rock. That's not HYDRA training. That's X-Men training.

And finally the wolf comes out. Fur and fangs and claws and all. But it still seems so, so human. She advances warily, uncertain what to do. Wolf or no, could she really hurt him? He doesn't budge. He banks on the fact that she won't. That even if she does, he still has a mission to complete. No matter what, he still has a mission. He brings his other hand up to the gun as well. "Rahne," he says with some of his first visible emotion in their entire exchange, "please. Please go human."

She stops at this. Her wolf form starts to fade. Is it because his words touch her? Can she see his tears, his pain? Or is it just the virus taking hold, killing her slowly, painfully? Like it was going to kill them all slowly? She rests on all fours, human now. She raises herself to her knees.

"That's how I want to remember you," he adds with a steady voice. This catches her off guard. She raises her head to look at him. It's met only with the barrel of the gun. "Beautiful."

DISHOOM!

And that's when it goes off. Rahne falls to the ground sideways. Blood creeps into the dirt from the side of her head. It's red like her hair. Jamie waits a moment. He takes a shaky breath and finally he brings down his arms. He kneels down beside her. The ground is slightly damp and it soaks through his jeans at the knees. He takes a hand and lightly brushes his knuckles against the soft vulnerable skin of her cheek. Only for a moment. She won't be so warm for much longer. Or ever again really. He tries to take as much of that with him as he can. He wants to absorb her with his touch. Carry her essence in his soul. He wants to hold her forever. A few of his tears escape, not that he much notices. He brings his face close to her ear but still so far away and whispers. "Always know that I loved you." That infamous green jacket slips off of his shoulders and is placed so gently over Rahne. Like he's tucking a child in for the night. It's the longest night of all.

It's almost over now isn't it? His mission? All he has to do now is finish sending HYDRA the rest of the information on Legacy and get the hell out of there before the students show up. HYDRA would get it public from there so every mutant from then on knew what they were dealing with. So that a cure could be found. So that no more innocent teenagers would have to be experimented on by the likes of the X-Men. So no more would be murdered. He could do that. He could save so many.

WHOOSH. It's such a distinct sound. Air rushing through engines. He'd recognize it anywhere. Jamie ducks instinctively. It comes again. Closer. Right over his head. It's massive and black and might as well be some dark shadowy monster reaching out with a clawed hand from one of his nightmares. The devil incarnate. The X-Jet. And it's come here to stop him. Jamie instantly breaks into a sprint. He isn't about to let that happen.

**_ooooo_**

They stand around the body in a half-circle. Even those that had never actually met the girl. That was probably the saddest part of the whole thing. That they would never get the chance. A few frays of Rahne's unruly red hair peek out from under the jacket that covers her top half. Poor girl never could calm that thing down.

It's almost ritualistic in manner. The way they hold down their heads and no one speaks. The way they all seem to share the same thoughts and feelings in their mourning. Or at least they feel like they do. Like they are all of one mind, one body. And now part of that body is dead.

Snikt. It's a familiar sound for all of them. And that's something they could use right about now. A touch of familiarity. A touch of home. But that's not all the Wolverine brings when he unsheathes his claws. He brings dread and realization. And pain.

He turns away quickly and walks off. The others watch. He looks so at place in the wilderness that way. The anger, the determination, the animal seeps off of him like sweat. They can see it. They can smell it.

"Wolverine," Bobby calls after him. He doesn't listen. "Wolverine." He says again as he catches up to the man-slash-monster. No response. "Logan!" An icy hand reaches for Wolverine. It grabs him by the front of his uniform and shoves him up against a tree. A few unsteady leaves rain to the ground around them. The others watch aghast but as far as either Iceman or Wolverine are concerned, there's nobody else around.

If Bobby were thinking, he never would've imagined he'd even get this far. How had those metal knuckles not come down on his face? How was he still standing? How was he still breathing? But he wasn't thinking. Not about that at least. And Logan? He is already faced with having to hurt one of his children today after seeing another dead on the forest floor. What man can bear to act so harshly on a third?

Wolverine growls from deep within his chest like a wild dog. It comes from his gut. It comes from his soul. Bobby can barely hear it, but he can feel it blow like a train through his presence. "What." He says slowly and quietly stressing each individual phoneme. It's not a question. He has no patience for this. He doesn't need to hear how Jamie deserves a second chance and to have some sympathy. Not after he'd seen what the kid did to Rahne. No, all the squirt really deserved was a gut full of adamantium. And Wolverine was going to give him just that.

The Iceman becomes less ice and more man. His grasp loosens slowly and Logan can see those blue eyes. "Please," he says so quietly. He sounds like a child. Hell, he is a child. A lost hurt little child. "Please," he says again. So much determination hidden in his voice. All of sudden, he wasn't asking. He wasn't begging. He was requesting, he was leading.

"Bobby," Wolverine says. Bobby, not Frosty or popsicle or ice cube. "What?"

"Find Moira first."


	14. enjoy your flight

**Chapter 14:** enjoy your flight

Click. Click. Tap. Tap. Jamie's hands are a blur on the keyboard, though you wouldn't know it to look at them. He feeds line after line of code onto the screen in front of him. Sending classified information through secure networks he technically had no real access to was always hard work. He's lucky he found this computer. He overestimated his skill as a hacker. Or did he underestimate it? He set out to destroy Muir's systems, and that he did. He did it so well in fact that he'd locked himself out of most of the computers too. But none of that mattered now. Now all that mattered was Legacy.

He glances at the time. Why? He has no idea how much time he really has. All he knows is that the X-Men are good. They'd find him soon enough. It's one thing to underestimate yourself, but quite another to underestimate your enemy, especially when they're the X-Men. He wants to blame his lack of time on his unexpected detour with Rahne but it only brings tears to his eyes and tears are of no use to HYDRA.

With one eye at the door and both ears constantly listening, he wishes there was some way to secure himself, not that a padlock or anything is any match for adamantium claws or a concentrated dose of lightening. He hears a noise. A rustling. Was that them? Were they here? Calm down Jamie. It's probably just a squirrel at the window. Just a squirrel? Idiot, isn't that just what they'd want you to think? Squirrel Girl, maybe. It doesn't matter either way. All that matters is that HYDRA gets the information they need. All that matters is that Legacy goes public.

More rustling. Shadows. No! He's not done. He can't be stopped now, after everything he's gone through. After everything that's happened.

He's not done.

Not yet.

_**ooooo**_

DKAAM!

Wolverine kicks open the door to Moira's lab. He sniffs around. The scent of coffee is strong. It inhibits his senses. On first inspection, the room looks empty. The few chairs and furniture strewn about mix with the files fallen on the floor. It's eerie the way the computers are on and they all wait for instruction from someone, but there's no one around to give them any.

Wolverine doesn't know much about computers or he would've noticed the information on the Legacy Virus on the screen to the right of him. That was what they told him James had been infected with. What he died from. Jamie was here. At sometime at least.

The other X-Men file in frantically searching for Moira or Jamie or anyone. By the time Wolverine hears the moan amidst the frenzied search, Beast has already found her. She's tied up to a chair and pushed hastily into a closet. There's an open wound on her forehead and it trickles blood down the side of her face slowly. She makes a noise again as she comes to with the help of Beast and his infinite medical knowledge.

"Moira?"

She can only say one thing. She can only think one thing. "It was Jamie."

"We know about Jamie. Where is he Moira? Is he here?"

"He's, he…"

_**ooooo**_

Jamie punches in the last few keys. "File transfer complete," the computer voice tells him. Just like Xavier to waste his money on useless crap like that. And just in time too, because he hears another crash. Like they're getting closer. But it doesn't matter. He's done.

_**ooooo**_

It's Prodigy that first notices the ripples in the coffee reminiscent of the T-rex scene in Jurassic Park as the ground starts to shake and they here a rumbling that comes from outside. After living in California Bobby can only picture an earthquake. But he knows better. A few of the others run off to see what's happening. There, in the distance, it's the X-Jet. Their X-Jet. And it's taking off.

_**ooooo**_

Jamie sits at the controls with a smile. With the influx of students at the Institute during his high school years, he didn't get that many lessons from the pilot seat. But look who's flying now. That's right Professor. The Professor and Scott and everyone else, he's in control.

He's surprised at how slow the X-Men are. They knew how advanced the computer on the X-Jet was and that Jamie had at least partial access to it. Was there any other logical place to go? It's funny to him that in a way the Professor was right. The X-Men would always be there for him when he needed them. And now he had their wings to prove it.

He was finally off for the bigger and better things that await.

_**ooooo**_

The X-Men simply watch. There's not much they _can_ do from here. They have no fliers and no energy manipulators. No leaders that have lasers for eyes or new recruits that can throw fire. How the hell did that happen?

Prodigy and Beast run back inside the lab. Maybe they can override Jamie's commands and get into the system. Or somehow send a message out to Xavier about their hijacked transport so he can disable it from there. It doesn't really matter though because so far, Jamie has been a pretty smart kid. He was going to drop it off somewhere as soon as he got the chance and then he was gone. White, male, 18-25, connections with HYDRA. They would never find him.

But Bobby ignores all this. He ignores his gawking teammates. He ignores the last resort clicking away of their newest team member. He ignores the fact that he is never going to make it up there. Jamie was not getting away. Bobby couldn't let him get away.

WHOOSH!

The jet comes quickly towards them and passes deliberately low over their heads. Bobby creates an ice slide and chases after it. Nobody tries to stop him. Or maybe they do and he just doesn't notice. The plane gets smaller and smaller but Bobby keeps going. Higher. Higher. And eventually he feels himself get weaker. The air is thinner up here. Harder to breathe. His ice seems to get thinner too. He can feel the cracks before they come almost like the ice, his only lifeline, is screaming out for _him_ to save _it_ instead. The jet is just too high. He's not going to make it up there. The cracks spread. He can't make it. No. It sounds like glass crashing below him. It can only mean one thing. His slide finally shattered. He falls.

And falls.

And falls.

Suddenly he feels a quick burst of wind as something flies quickly by him. Superman? No. Better. It's Beak!

Beak flies clumsily towards Bobby. He's falling so far and so fast Bobby worries that it doesn't matter anyways. Just then Beak's legs swing around Bobby's chest tightly and he jerks up suddenly as Beak struggles to keep the two in the air. Bobby holds on for dear life in a backwards piggyback where he is fully dependent on the teen on his back. He finally has a chance to look at the ground far below. Beak just saved his life.

"Barnell Bohusk," he screams above the sound of the air moving swiftly past their ears, "I think I might just have to marry you."

They fall closer and closer to the ground despite Beak's best attempts at slowing them down. After all, Beak was never known for his flying ability and Bobby was never considered a lightweight.

"And if you can keep us from splattering onto the forest floor," his savior screams down genuinely scared but showing no trace of it, "I might just have to say yes."

Bobby looks at the quickly approaching forest floor. Shit. They were still going to die weren't they? He points one hand down unwilling to release his entire grip from Barnell. There's a tingle in his fingers that wasn't there previously. That's never a good sign. He tries again as Barnell fights a losing battle against gravity. There's only frostiness on his fingers, like a cold morning dew.

Again.

"Bobby! I'm losing it!"

And again.

Suddenly the two of them drop as Beak really does lose his glide and flaps his arms furiously to catch the air again. Now or never, Bobby thrusts both hands down and from the fleshy sun created from his joined palms and fingers comes the prettiest thing either boy had ever seen. Ice. Perhaps this is why they call him the Iceman.

The massive ice slide coats the freshly green leaves of the treetops creating almost a bowl for them to land in. And they do land. Clumsily and at great speed. They tumble closer towards the ground Bobby creating the slide the best he can as they fall. Bruised and battered along the way, eventually they both land in the dirt and the leaves when the slide runs out. They both lay there grasping at any breath they can find, muddy cuts and friction burns dotting their skin. Bobby on his back, he raises his head searching for Beak to make sure he's not injured. Beak holds one of his arms tightly (another break perhaps?) and chuckles. Who couldn't help but be a little giddy after such a glorious and fruitful fight against the grim reaper?

"Dude," he laughs, "I know I said it, but I really don't want to marry you."

This triggers only slightly in Bobby's mind almost mechanically. He looks up at the sky, the jet all those feet above them, shrinking away into nothingness. He lets out a quick sigh as he collapses back onto the ground. And then he sees something. Like little birds or something. He squints, "Hey, Barney? Is that?"

"Yup." Beak smiles proudly. "The girls."

_**ooooo**_

The special class tag team their way with the X-Jet. The twins in their super-powered 34-year-old body lead the attack at the front as they fight the advances of the oncoming jet. Yes, they're just that amazing. Buff, no doubt carried up there by the twins, stands on the wing as she tries to punch her way in. But Jamie doesn't notice. He's too busy trying to direct the plane with the twins on his nose pretending to be Superman and the Blackbird a missile. After several tries the persistent drumbeats of Buff's fist end with a crash as she finally manages to punch her hand into the main cabin. It sounds of a million aluminum cans being crushed at once as the once bulletproof armor tears away from its metal frame. Jamie turns around startled to see her bare hand. It won't take long before they make their way completely inside and when they do he wonders what kind of sound his jaw will make when it comes in contact with that muscled fist.

And he knows he probably deserves it. Probably? He does deserve it.

The pressure from the constantly changing altitude is intense and soon Jaime feels as he did when he was sick and high on cough medicine. Like his head would just float away from his body if not attached by that tether of a neck. Out of desperation he thinks of his trusty sidekick. The metal one at his waist that holds five bullets still. It's dotted with Moira's blood and Rahne's death. In a quick fleeting moment he considers using it to shoot at his friends just to save himself. These innocents. He's already done much worse. But he can't. And it doesn't matter much anyway because it takes everything he has just to steer the plane, and of course bulletproof means both sides. The Professor and Logan never trained him on the jet's external weapons. Had they known somehow what would happen?

The blackbird's high-pitched screaming that started with Buff's Herculean punch starts to fade. Or is it only in his mind? The ship's controls are as chaotic as the rest of the situation. It doesn't understand why it tries to go forward but keeps moving down, closer and closer to the ground. Like how Jaime's stomach can't seem to sync up with the rest of him. And then there's a spark on the keyboard. Jamie pulls his hands back instinctively. The screens fade, the lights flicker off. It's almost as if something is shorting out the electronics. And then there's the sound of bugs (or sand almost?) hitting the windshield, but they're too high up.

Yes, too high up for regular sand but not for Dust! Man's high-tech helpers are no match for the Earth's simplest building blocks. She must have jammed the system in her powerful form. Clever thinking, Sooraya. No wonder Xavier wanted to keep you for himself.

And finally Jamie hears the worst sound of all. Silence. The girls have stopped. The alarms have stopped.

The engines have stopped.

Where had it gone? His exhilaration. His lust for life. His… cockiness? All he feels now is that fear. Fear of the imminent. That fear of death. Though he promised himself as James that he never would again.

_**ooooo**_

Gordon holds Illyana's hand as they both stare into the sky watching their friends fight for what could be their lives. Gordon turns his head. He hears something. He lets go and Illyana doesn't notice. He runs through the wilds of the forest. A few rustles here and there as he makes his way clumsily through the trees.

She hears this. "Gordon?" She calls as she goes after him. "Where are you going?"

Gordon hears his name but he doesn't respond. Those aren't the calls he's interested in.

He's a fast little thing. And small. He disappears easily, but that's not the intention. "Gordon? Gordon?" And then she sees him. He just stands there. Staring. Illyana comes up behind him. She stops suddenly as she sees it no more than ten yards away. The mass on the floor. She places her hands on his shoulders and pulls the boy into her, holds him close. They both know what this is, but they refuse to believe it.

Illyana can only stare but Gordon advances cautiously. "What are you doing?" she asks.

Gordon turns to her. "She's calling me," he says. "She's so sad." He reaches for the jacket and Illyana moves closer to stop him, but she can't. She doesn't want to get any closer to _it_. Gordon puts his hand on the jacket. He recognizes it. That dark green with the six yellowish circles around the front zipper. It's Jamie's. He pulls it away slowly.

"It's… just a dog?" she asks confused though much more relieved.

"No." He puts a comforting hand on the red-brown fur just above the eye. "It's Rahne."

_**ooooo**_

Buff manages to pull a chunk of the wall away in the split second before the plane goes into complete free fall but it doesn't matter. It's still too small and way too late. She jumps away before the falling plane can take her down with it and the twins rush to catch her. Dust sandstorms her own way down.

Nicole and Claudette debate each other with the speed of their single mind. They might not be able to squeeze into that little hole and it's true, they're not sure if they can make it out before the plane crashes but they also know they can't answer any of these questions until they try. And they would too, if they didn't have Arlee hanging from their grasp. They can't work fast or be agile enough with her added weight and she would never survive the fall from that distance. The choice not to go after him fills them with guilt though it was never really a choice at all. They just keep thinking about how Jamie still has a chance inside the plane. It is an X-Men jet after all, built with the needs of the X-Men in mind. And the greatest need of all that planned to one day see combat the way the X-Men did is survival.

They watch and they hope. And they pray. Until the very last second. Until they hear the…

CRASH!


	15. I dreamt another nightmare

**Chapter 15:** I dreamt another nightmare.

Jamie feels the hard floor behind his head. Not a pain or anything. Just an observation of his surroundings. He doesn't remember how he ended up there so far from the seat he was strapped into. At first he feels nothing else and then he gets a warm sensation about his legs. The part of himself that he thought he lost so long ago thinks about how funny it would be if he just pissed his pants. But he knows better. And honestly he doesn't know if he even cares anymore.

Jamie opens his eyes slowly. He can't see much but he sees the blood. And the huge piece of glass jutting out from his stomach. Perhaps that's why he's breathing so hard. So hard it gurgles.

He expects to see plenty of himselves there to greet him with an impact like that. But there's none. There's nobody. It's lonely. It's been lonely for such a long time. How long had it been since he last created another dupe? He's forgotten what it felt like and it's only now that he can't that he realizes just how much he missed it. Had Rahne managed to infect him too then? Again? Or is he just that badly hurt? Either way he was going to die wasn't he?

He tries to prop himself up as best he can and manages only to raise his head from off the ground and lean it against the back of a chair. He can't move much further than that. There's little strength left in his arms and one of his legs is pinned. It makes him wonder if it's a good thing he can't feel much.

With a sudden creak the doors to the jet are pried open. Random team members from both teams file in outlining a horizon of heads. What were they expecting? After a fall like that, he was still going to have some fight in him? He was going to attack the lot of them with windshield sticking out of his gut? His one compared to their 10, 15, 20 or so? The bewildered looks on their faces say otherwise. That maybe _they_ didn't even know what they were expecting. Can he blame them?

They all keep their distance. Standing around dumbstruck, watching him. Half-circled around him just as before. Before with Rahne, before when he was dying as James, before at his funeral. And just like before, nobody knows what to do. He doesn't want to see them, not that that matters any.

Bobby walks in. He's the last to enter. He has such a presence about him suddenly. Like an adult in a room of children. The adult they joked in high school he would never be. Jamie can't believe it's been almost a year since the last time they've looked eye to eye. He makes his way past everyone else, but with the way they open a path for him like he's royalty or something, it's not hard. He stands right in front of the injured… Man? Friend? Murderer?

"Jamie." For the moment it's all he knows to say. "I still can't believe it was you." He adds softly. His voice is steady but he has tears in his eyes. "Please tell me it wasn't really you."

"I can't. I'm sorry, Bobby, but I can't."

"You bastard," he says as maliciously as he can muster. He wants it to hurt like he is hurt. Like Rahne had hurt. "You killed her!"

"I know. And now I'm dying for it." Jamie chuckles as best he can. It hurts though it almost feels good just to feel anything at all. "How's that for poetic justice?"

Bobby hates the laugh more than anything. That he _can_ still laugh that wet murmur of a laugh. That he's still the same Jamie that used to laugh at the pranks they pulled on him right along with everyone else. That he can laugh while he sits there dying. And while it brings up those memories and those feelings of longing and friendship and family, he suddenly sees such evil in it. But his laugh, behind the pain and sound of bubbling liquid, it hasn't changed. Not really. It makes Bobby wonder if maybe it had been evil all along.

"Maybe there is a God after all," Jamie continues. He doesn't know why he goes on. Why he feels such a need to continue. Because he needs to explain himself? Because, even though they really should, if he keeps talking maybe they won't kill him right on the spot? Because he wants to relive a time before things got to be so incredibly complicated when they were all just friends and could just sit around and talk? He didn't know. He didn't care to know. He just keeps talking. "I guess that's really the saddest thing of all. You know why? Because now, while God holds her up there in Heaven," he snickers again, "He's gonna send me to Hell."

"No. You're not dying now. Not yet. It's not going to be that easy for you." Bobby turns around and addresses someone. Jamie doesn't recognize him. New. A replacement even. "Get Hank. Tell him we need him. Now! Arlee, contact the closest healer. Most likely it'll be Josh. And somebody get that back compartment open and see what medical supplies we can salvage!"

They were going to save him? Really? But why? After all he'd done, why? Because it was Bobby. And Bobby didn't understand the evil of the X-Men. He didn't understand that Jamie couldn't go back. He'd been prisoner to them once before. For seven years he lived in their confinement. Their brainwashing superiority and murderous ways. Their evil. He wasn't going to do it again. He couldn't do it again. He'd rather be dead. And he still has his gun. Jamie reaches with numb bloody fingers to his side where he knows it hasn't left. Of all others, his gun wouldn't betray him in his time of need. He pulls it out from beside him and points it forward before he can bring it to his head because with his limited motion he can only work it with both hands.

But a young girl with long blond hair cannot take her sweet loving eyes from the boy. Is that… Paige? Jamie's Guthrie. Hers are the only eyes that seem to care and it's unfortunate because these are also the only eyes that see Jamie take his loaded gun and seemingly point it at her fellow X-Man. Point it at… "Bobby!"

Chck. Jamie cocks his gun one final time.

"Watch out!"

Bobby swings around. His arm reaches out towards Jamie and from it shoots a massive ice spear. It pierces Jamie straight through the chest. Right in his heart. Jamie looks at it for a moment. All that's allowed him by his no longer beating heart. Stabbed through the heart with a piece of ice? He gives off a feeble attempt at a smile.

Now this is poetic justice.

**_ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo_**

**Somewhere in North America**

BAM! Jamie sits desolate outside the Institute gates while change rains down on him. BAM! His funeral, his grave, his tombstone. BAM! Mutant cows and radioactive leeches. BAM! Rahne is so beautiful. She's beautiful and she's caring and she's the best friend he's ever had. BAM! And she loves him. BAM! BAM! The computers, the research. Gordon, Moira. BAM! Distance, fever, sickness. BAM! Legacy. BAM! BAM! BAM! The betrayal, the attacks, the blood, the death.

It all shoots back to him. A full year in mere seconds. And the pain. The loss. It all shoots back to him just so he can lose it again. Just so his soul can be torn apart one more time. Just so he can die. Again.

It's too much. He can't handle it.

"AAAAAAAAAHHH!" Jamie screams an anguished scream until there is nothing left. Until it feels like his lungs are trying to follow the air out of his body too. He sits rigidly hunched over in his chair. He grabs his heart as his face turns red. He forgets how to breathe.

"Jamie! Jamie!" Roommate number one calls to him as he holds the boy's shoulders trying desperately to shake the demons out of him. Jamie doesn't notice. He doesn't notice anything. "Jamie!"

Finally, as if back from the dead, he takes in a huge gasp of air. And then another and another. What does this mean? What of the light? Hicksville?

He blinks away his blurred vision to take in his surroundings. The folding chair he sits in and his roommate's concerned face just inches from his own. He remembers now. His apartment and the chemistry midterm scheduled for later in the day. The one he just spent all night studying for. Right? It's hard sometimes to tell. Both lives feel so real. They are.

"What happened? Are you okay?"

Jamie looks for the voice. It's Marcus. "Yeah. Yeah." He whispers.

"What happened?"

It hurts to die he wants to say, still holding his chest where Bobby speared him. It hurts to die. And Jamie knows. He's gone through it twice already. The first was murder. Murder for a science experiment and it was horrible and it was wrong. The second was sacrifice, what had to be done. The only way to make the first right. And there would be another, one day. But hopefully only one more. So maybe at least he wouldn't be haunted by the pain of that one. He could die and it would really be over.

"I'm taking you to the hospital."

"No." Jamie objects still breathless. "I just had a bad dream," he says.

"A bad dream?" Marcus asks suspiciously.

"Yeah. But I'm fine now."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

Marcus looks over at their tiny kitchen table littered with Jamie's school materials. Open textbooks, scribbled on sheets of paper, a sunset over Africa displayed on the laptop screensaver, eraser leavings, two empty coffee mugs and an unopened can of energy drink. "Oh, chem," he says in a voice obviously familiar with the subject. "Well that explains it."

Jamie looks at him with eyes still looking out over Muir. "Huh?"

"You falling asleep when you're supposed to be studying and then having nightmares. What happened? Did a molecule come to life and then try to eat you or something?"

"Something like that." Jamie uses the table as leverage to help himself up. His legs are weak from the shock and he hopes he can walk. "Um, I've gotta use the bathroom," he says distractedly as an excuse. For some paranoid reason he feels the need to explain himself. What if Marcus finds out? What if he can tell what just happened? If the X-Men taught him anything, it was the importance of always watching your back. Always cover your tracks.

"Okay?" His roommate answers in confusion.

God, if he had any idea. Maybe he did.

Jamie enters their tiny bathroom and closes the door quickly behind him. He leans against the wall by the toilet. 'Just five minutes Jamie' he says to himself. 'You're allowed five minutes.' He turns on the faucet across from him to cover up any noise and slides down the wall until he lands on the cold ground. He pulls his legs up tightly to his chest and his back arches as he buries his face into his knees. His body shakes and there comes from it a slight whimper of a sound.

It's the sound of crying.

* * *

The end. No not really. Please stay with me for the 16th and final chapter due to be posted sometime next week. Reviews are appreciated and as always thank you for reading.


	16. the legacy of Jamie Madrox

**Epilogue:** the legacy of Jamie Madrox

**One year earlier,  
****Shortly after the death of James Madrox**

He can't remember how long it's been. How long since he's died. Time has no more meaning. Nothing in life has any more meaning. Jamie jams his fists into the pocket of his infamous green jacket. It's the middle of summer in New York but Jamie doesn't feel like he can ever get warm enough again. He flinches. There's something sharp in his pocket. He rubs his thumb over the smooth surface of the object. It's the business card, the one from the old man in the park (remember him Jamie?) and it's given him a paper cut. He's thankful almost because the cut brings about a sense of relief. A quick distraction. For a second he breathes easier.

He pulls the card out. He had forgotten about it. There's nothing printed on it, only a hand-written phone number. No area code. He's intrigued. It's the first sensation he's felt in quite awhile. That's twice already this little card has saved him in just as little a time. For this reason alone he decides to give it a try. What can it hurt that isn't already hurting?

It rings three times and just as Jamie is about to hang up he hears the click. "Hello, Jamie," comes a distant sounding voice from the other side of the line. Her voice is serene, almost seductive over the phone. It melds with the static and random clicks that come across the bad connection to sound like ocean waves rolling over him.

"How do you know my name?" Jamie asks in a monotone.

"There are a lot of things we know."

The conversation goes dead when Jamie does not answer but he does not hang up. He keeps waiting. For something. "Who are you?" he asks finally.

"My name is Laura Brown and the organization I work for has a proposition for you. It has to do with your… loss."

"What?" Jamie's voice begins to gain some intonation. "My loss?"

"Yes. I believe his name was James?"

For a moment there is nothing. "Was…" Jamie's voice squeaks with emotion. His body shakes in anger. Anger not directed at her but at death itself. "Was it you? Did you have something to do with it?" As soon as he gets the words out the water starts its silent descent from his eyes creating little wet trails down his face. "Were you responsible?"

"No," she answers calmly in her crisp clean voice. "But I think we can help you find out who was."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

**Present Day**

A paper blows by like tumbleweed caught in a storm. Its pages are emblazoned with colorful pictures and choppy shots of celebrities and politicians caught without their contacts thus displaying obviously photo-shopped bright lizard like eyes and a man holding his newly born half-alien daughter. It screams headlines of the end of the world brought on by secret underground wars and the truth about that little red light in your smoke detectors that acts as a voice recorder when called upon by some still largely unknown force. In one corner in tiny print there's a $2.99 US meaning someone actually paid money for the thing before using it to peel the gum off his shoe. And on the back page, there was one last headline. It read, "First AIDS, then SARS, now Legacy?: the proven governmental conspiracies responsible for the attempted decimation of 'undesirable' communities."

That's right. Legacy was public.

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

**Muir Island**

The grass seems to squeak underneath Bobby's shoe. To scream out in self-preservation as he crushes the life out of it. Damn grass was greener than the one they had over in Bayville. And that bothers him the most. The juxtaposition of the live healthy grass over Jamie's cold dead body. Why do they get to live when Jamie doesn't? He digs his toes vengefully deeper into the dirt leaving a little muddy bald spot behind. That's what he did. Killed things like that.

He faces east and the late morning sun reaches straight for his eyes with its bright yellow light. Bobby squints as he reads the inscription once again. "James A. Madrox: He takes with him a part of our souls." Souls, plural this time. For all of us. It's funny; Bobby never took the squirt to be that deep of a guy. Huh, idiot.

He takes in a deep breath of the sweet air and clenches his hand around his phone tightly in his pocket just to fidget. It doesn't work out here anyway. "Rahne would've liked to be here," he says as he exhales.

"The way he talked about her, I bet she would." Bobby turns to look at his companion. Paige Guthrie sits on the grass beside him. She hugs her knees close to her chest. Her long blonde hair is pulled behind her head in a loose ponytail allowing a few fringes to frame her face. Along her eyes Bobby notices the faintest hint of makeup. He can come up with two reasons for this. Either she wanted to look nice for Jamie or she'd been crying again.

"It's getting late." Bobby offers his hand to her and she takes it to pull herself up. He starts walking but stops only a few feet away as he feels a tug on his arm. Paige isn't following. She still stands there at the engraved stone. With two fingers at her lips, she kisses gently, and caressingly brushes the tips of her fingers over Jamie's name. Her eyes turn to Bobby and he can see that wavering look of vulnerability deep within them. He squeezes her hand in support and hopes it's enough because there's not a whole lot he has to give.

But it must be because she smiles back, the eternal optimist that she is. She raises their joined hands just slightly and looks at them. A hint of amusement in her voice, "My brother's so going to kill you." And somehow they find the strength to walk away, to leave their friend behind again, together.

_**ooooo**_

Bobby looks again at his watch though it still displays New York time. It's nice to have a reminder of another place half a world away. But Bobby knows that even Bayville is a different place now though undoubtedly the city itself hasn't changed. Bobby has. He brings his hand back down to hover over the clean metal doorknob. He had been stalling this way for a good five minutes now, random students watching him but they don't dare say a thing. Not that they have the courage, or the words. Finally he pushes down and opens the door just a crack. He peers in through the slit at the room's occupant.

Moira sits in one of the chairs left for visitors. The sunlight from the window beside her bathes her in a dim orange glow. Her head leans back awkwardly and her eyes are closed. Her legs are wrapped in a generic hospital blanket making it painfully obvious to him where they are. And why.

Bobby inhales deeply and holds his breath until he enters the room fully as if plunging head first into a freezing pool. Once inside he lets the breath out of his mouth unconsciously and Moira turns to the sound. "Bobby?" she asks half asleep. As she raises her head to face him he gets a better glimpse of the massive white gauze used to hide all the stitches while they heal. Though the stitches weren't half the worry as the 'concussion' and the 'head trauma,' but by now they all knew she was going to make a full and quick recovery.

"I'm sorry I woke you, but you know you should be sleeping in your bed anyways."

"Don't you start that too now. Hospital beds make me feel sick."

"I thought you were a doctor," he chides.

"I am a doctor. And I went through way too much work than to be questioned by the likes of you."

Bobby smiles as he threatens her. "Then why don't I just bring the Professor in here. See what he has to say."

"Don't you dare do such a thing, Robert," Moira answers in joke yet authoritatively as she uses a finger and his full given name. It's a good moment for the both of them.

Bobby sighs a longing breath. "I've missed you Moira."

And she smiles in her motherly way, "I know. Come." She pulls an empty chair closer to herself and pats it. "Sit." Bobby complies. "Any news from the outside world?"

"None. But you know what they say about no news being good news," he jokes almost.

It gives Moira hope that one day he'll once again be the jokester he once was so very long ago. "True. And I think we could all use a bit of good news."

"And the news from the inside world?" he asks.

"She'll be okay they say." Bobby turns away from Moira to look for the first time at the room's rightful occupant. Moira continues with a mother's pride, "But the two of us already knew that didn't we? Nothing can keep our Rahne down."

Rahne Sinclair lay in that hospital bed with the sheet up to her chest but her arms remain uncovered. She looks like James did that full year ago. Like she herself did on the forest floor, only this time Bobby knows she's alive. He reaches over and takes her hand in his. Not to hold necessarily. Just to touch, because sometimes he only believes it when he can feel her warmth for himself. He rubs a thumb over her soft round knuckles. It's like the best dream he's ever had.

"They don't want to use drugs you know. So Charles is keeping her asleep. Her healing factor is taking care of the rest, with a little help from your healer." She nods in the direction of the door where a large bouquet of flowers sits on a table. "He brought those flowers in just yesterday."

Bobby smiles. He guesses Josh couldn't be as big of a slimy weasel as he once thought, and it's funny because he can't even remember why he thought it in the first place.

"She'll be okay." Moira reiterates. "They'll be okay."

It's hard for Bobby to take his eyes off of the miracle before him. Moira understands. She often feels the same way. "I can't believe she's doing it all herself with just her healing factor," he says more as a statement than amazement. "It's gotten so strong."

Moira smiles again. "You'd be amazed at what a woman's body can do when pregnant. When it's got a little baby to take care of." She's going to be a grandmother.

"So the fever, her powers, that was all really just…"

"Her body reacting to the news."

The news. Bobby smiles at the euphemism. He likes to think of it a little differently. He likes to call it, "A little Jamie."

_**ooooo ooooo break ooooo ooooo**_

**Somewhere in North America**

The laughter of children rings high in the air. Swings squeak and feet thump onto the sand below. Jamie, this Jamie, Madrox Prime, took a psychology class once. It was all about the difficulties of growing up and how the smallest childhood instances turn all adults into the neuroses filled messes that they always are. Thank God, Jamie never wanted to be a psychologist. He wasn't one to argue about the inherent psychological issues that come with being an adult. He just knew he loved his childhood.

Playing go fish on the floor because the adults thought they might be less destructive away from furniture. Indian burns and mudfights and loogies. And best of all sick days and nightmares because sleeping in his parents' bed was so much better than sleeping in his own. But somewhere along the way he lost that. His life had become the nightmare and this time he couldn't just snuggle into his mother's soft warm arms. He couldn't wake up to do it. That was the feeling at least.

He wonders when it happened. When he lost it all. When he lost himself. Was it when James had died? Was it that beautiful night when Rahne took his dupe's, and really his, virginity? Did he leave it behind with Paige in Hicksville or with the old man in the park? Maybe it was still at the HYDRA compound where he trained for those two intense weeks when he had 'run away' from the Institute after James' death. Maybe the dupe he had planted at the Institute to 'dupe' his friends at the end of those two weeks took it away to Muir with him. Or maybe it was as simple as growing up. He had to trade it all in that day of graduation to receive his diploma, to become an adult.

Jamie looks up at the bench across from his. A young mother quickly averts her eyes and continues rocking a stroller gently. Jamie laughs inside. They must think he's some kind of creep or something to hang around by the playground like that. But it was just that, it's been so long. He wants to remember what it felt like again. What it was like to play and not care and be home. Maybe that door is closed forever, but there's nothing wrong with looking in the window every now and then. And maybe, in the future one day, he'll have a kid of his own. And he'll bring her to the park and push her on the swings and joke about all the little boys in diapers that will never be good enough to marry her. And he'll give her the childhood he had. One day, in the future. Because that's what he has now. A future. For the first time in a long time, he has a future.

Jamie grips the papers in his hands unconsciously a little tighter at the thought but quickly releases it so as not to cause any permanent creases. That's what he was holding. His future literally in his hands. Jamie did his job for HYDRA and now they were doing their part. It really would've been enough though to know the reason for his death. To be able to save the countless mutants out there from ever having to go through what James went through without knowing why. There could be a cure now. Because of what Jamie had done. Because of what he had sacrificed. And so he felt lucky that HYDRA was offering him more. That they were giving him the chance to disappear. To start over again. No more X-Men, no more HYDRA, no more Jamie.

It was this last one Jamie was stuck on. Every other line of every other page laying down the foundation of his new past, the forging of a new childhood, had been filled out days ago with only one last blank staring at him still. Name. In truth, Jamie Madrox had disappeared long ago, but he had never considered who had taken his place.

Jamie chuckles slightly as he remembers the last time he had to name something. Gordon had decided to become father to a freshly caught slug he assumed was orphaned and gave Jamie the honor of bestowing it an identity. To be funny Jamie responded with NaCl, the elemental name for table salt, the slug family's mortal enemy. Gordon of course didn't understand the humor but was happy nonetheless. He ran around the compound with his jar for a week telling stories about Nackle this and Nackle that. The memory suddenly saddens him. Jamie wonders whatever happened to Nackle. And he wonders what's going to happen to Gordon. Ha, Nackle. If nothing else he owes it to Gordon to do better this time.

The memories of it all, of his times with his mother, as the youngest in a house of teenagers, of the initiation to become a full fledged member of the special class, and everything else that happened before after and in between, give him a sudden moment of clarity. Finally he puts the pen to paper. 'Drake Sinclair' he writes. An homage to his two good friends.

The one he killed and the one that killed him.


End file.
